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And then if you'll pray for us afterwards, please.
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Thank you. Mark chapter 5.
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They came to the other side of the sea, to the country of the Gerasenes. And when
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Jesus had stepped out of the boat, immediately there met him out of the tombs a man with an unclean spirit.
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He lived among the tombs, and no one could bind him anymore, not even with a chain. For he had often been bound with shackles and chains, but he wrenched the chains apart, and he broke the shackles in pieces.
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No one had the strength to subdue him. Night and day among the tombs and on the mountains, he was always crying out and cutting himself with stones.
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And when he saw Jesus from afar, he ran and fell down before him. And crying out with a loud voice, he said,
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What have you to do with me, Jesus, Son of the Most High God? I adjure you by God, do not torment me.
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For he was saying to him, Come out of the man, you unclean spirit. And Jesus asked him,
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What is your name? He replied, My name is Legion, for we are many. And he begged him earnestly not to send him, not to send them out of the country.
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Now a great herd of pigs was feeding there on the hillside, and they begged him, saying, Send us to the pigs, let us enter them.
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So he gave them permission. And the unclean spirits came out and entered the pigs.
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And the herd, numbering about 2 ,000, rushed down the steep bank into the sea and drowned in the sea.
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The herdsmen fled and told it in the city and in the country. The people came to see what it was that had happened.
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And they came to Jesus and saw the demon -possessed man, the one who had had the Legion sitting there, clothed in his right mind, and they were afraid.
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And those who had seen it described to them what had happened to the demon -possessed man and to the pigs.
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And they began to beg Jesus to depart from their region. As he was getting into the boat, the man who had been possessed with demons begged him that he might be with him.
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And he did not permit him, but said to him, Go home to your friends and tell them how much the
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Lord has done for you and how he has had mercy on you. And he went away and began to proclaim in the
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Decapolis how much Jesus had done for him, and everyone marveled. And when
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Jesus had crossed again into the boat to the other side, a great crowd gathered about him, and he was beside the sea.
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Then came one of the rulers of the synagogue, Jairus by name, and seeing him, he fell at his feet and implored him earnestly, saying,
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My little daughter is at the point of death. Come and lay your hands on her so that she may be made well and live.
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And he went with him. And a great crowd followed him and thronged about him.
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And there was a woman who had a discharge of blood for 12 years and who had suffered much under many physicians and had spent all she had and was no better but rather grew worse.
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She had heard the reports about Jesus and came up behind him in the crowd and touched his garment.
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For she said, If I touch even his garments, I will be made well. And immediately the flow of blood dried up, and she felt in her body that she was healed of her disease.
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And Jesus, perceiving in himself that power had gone out from him, immediately turned about in the crowd and said,
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Who touched my garments? And his disciples said to him, You see the crowd pressing around you, and yet you say,
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Who touched me? And he looked around to see who had done it. But the woman, knowing what had happened to her, came in fear and trembling and fell down before him and told him the whole truth.
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And he said to her, Daughter, your faith has made you well. Go in peace and be healed of your disease.
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While he was still speaking, there came from the ruler's house some who said, Your daughter is dead.
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Why trouble the teacher any further? But overhearing what they said, Jesus said to the ruler of the synagogue,
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Do not fear, only believe. And he allowed no one to follow him except Peter and James and John, the brother of James.
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They came to the house of the ruler of the synagogue, and Jesus saw a commotion, people weeping and wailing loudly.
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And when he had entered, he said to them, Why are you making a commotion and weeping? The child is not dead, but sleeping.
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And they laughed at him. But he put them all outside and took the child's father and mother and those who were with him and went in to where the child was.
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Taking her by the hand, he said to her, Telethekumai, which means, Little girl,
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I say to you, arise. And immediately the girl got up and began walking, for she was twelve years of age.
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And they were immediately overcome with amazement. And he strictly charged them that no one should know this and told them to give her something to eat.
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Let's pray. Our gracious Heavenly Father, we thank you for this account that shows the power of Jesus Christ, the power of his words, the power of his works.
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And Lord, the power that existed then still exists today. And you are ruling on the throne in heaven.
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And Lord, we pray that we also would be amazed, that we would be overcome with amazement as we behold who you truly are.
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So Lord, as we begin to study the Scriptures and we hear the sermon, we pray that we would get a clear picture of who
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Christ is, that we would submit to that, that we would recognize the authority of the word of God, and that we would be forever changed.
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Lord, give us enlightenment as we behold Christ in the Scriptures. Thank you,
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Lord, in Jesus' name. Amen. Well, let's turn to John's Gospel again,
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John chapter 5. We've mentioned several times that one of the distinctions of John's Gospel from the
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Synoptic Gospels, which of course are Matthew, Mark, and Luke, is that where the
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Synoptic Gospels record basically the growing understanding of the disciples as to who
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Jesus is. John's Gospel, however, seems to be more of a self -disclosure of Jesus for who he is.
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And so there seems to be a greater depth of substance and content as to his identity and his relationship with the
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Father and with the Holy Spirit as recorded in John's Gospel, and we're going to see that in the passage before us today.
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Last Lord's Day we considered the third sign of Jesus recorded in John's Gospel in which he healed the lame man, and he did so on the
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Sabbath day. The man had been lame for 38 years, and he healed him.
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Well, the episode before us today, of course, follows and flows from that event, and we are going to begin to consider this prolonged speech of Jesus, which has been commonly referred to or called the third discourse of Jesus.
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That would be in the Gospel of John. And so John records seven signs or miracles, and then immediately following those seven signs you have seven prolonged discourses of Jesus that the sign generated or gave occasion for Jesus to teach.
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Now, the actual discourse or speech of Jesus begins with verse 19 and continues through verse 47.
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And here is, I think, a good summary of the overarching theme of this sermon of Jesus, this third discourse.
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Jesus is so intimately connected to the Father that there is nothing God has ever done in history or in himself that is exclusive of Jesus.
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Everything God has ever said and done is now in his hands. To reject
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Jesus is not only disbelief in God, but is also a revealing depiction of the true object of humanity's faith, the self.
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Today we'll only consider the first portion of this passage because of its length, and so we'll examine the meaning and implications of verses 16 through 23, which read as follows, and this is in the
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New King James Version. For this reason the Jews persecuted Jesus and sought to kill him because he had done these things on the
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Sabbath. But Jesus answered them, My Father has been working until now, and I have been working.
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Therefore the Jews sought all the more to kill him because he not only broke the Sabbath, but also said that God was his
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Father, making himself equal with God. And then
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Jesus answered and said to them, Most assuredly I say to you, the Son can do nothing of himself, but what he sees the
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Father do, for whatever he does the Son also does in like manner. For the
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Father loves the Son and shows him all things that he himself does, and he will show him greater works than these that you may marvel.
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For as the Father raises the dead and gives life to them, even so the Son gives life to whom he will.
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For the Father judges no one, but has committed all judgment to the Son, that all should honor the
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Son just as they honor the Father. He who does not honor the Son does not honor the
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Father who sent him. Here we read of the unbelief and dishonor showed to Jesus by the
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Jews, which in this passage in John's Gospel we should understand as the Jewish leaders and particularly those of Jerusalem.
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We read that in failing to honor Jesus as God's Son, they were also failing to honor
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God, his Father, the one they believed and claimed to have been their God, but they were dishonoring him.
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In this episode of John's Gospel, we will have reinforced for us the truths of the deity of the
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Lord Jesus, the relationship and cooperation between the Son and the
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Father in the work of divine providence within the world, and of the responsibility that the
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Father has entrusted to his Son to accomplish his will in history, as well as the final judgment of all mankind.
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This is a rich passage. It's not an easy one by any means. Everything in the passage before us ultimately instructs us that we are to honor
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Jesus Christ as the Son of God, who is the second person of the blessed Holy Trinity, and in honoring the
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Son, we do honor the Father. Now, again, the passage that we read that you have in your text, if you have your notes in front of you, is from the
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New King James Version. And thankfully, there are no major textual variants between Greek manuscripts of this passage, as there were last week in the passage we considered.
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However, we should point out the difference in the division of the paragraphs in the
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New King James Version, and say the English Standard Version, or the ESV, as well as the
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New International Version, the NIV, you know, the other most popular English translations.
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Of course, the original Greek text that John the Apostle penned back in the first century had no paragraph designations.
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In fact, it did not have sentence designations. In fact, it didn't have spaces between words.
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They were just letters, one after another, from one side of the page of the scroll to the other side.
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There were no paragraph designations. Paragraph divisions are a rather modern invention, perhaps dating to the 1400s.
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The designation of paragraphs, therefore, in our English translations are supplied by the translators of the
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Bible, and they differ from one another. In other words, the translators of Greek into English would differ as to how sentences should be identified, structured, and grouped together.
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And by definition, a paragraph, of course, an expression of a single thought. And yet, there's differences in the paragraph designations between these
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English translations. And so here, the translators of the New King James Version distinguished a paragraph containing verses 16 and 17 with a new paragraph beginning with verse 18 that continues through verse 23.
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You're not gonna remember all this. I actually put down lower in quotations the paragraph divisions of each of these translations for you to look at, and you can see the divisions quite clearly.
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The ESV is different, however, in their designation of paragraphs, and then the
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NIV differs from the other two. And so if you look at the text there, the
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New King James Version, again, you have a paragraph, verses 12 through 14, a separate paragraph of verse 15, a paragraph of verses 16 and 17, and then a paragraph of verses 18 and following goes all the way to verse 23,
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I believe. In contrast, you have the ESV, where you have a single paragraph from all the way from the middle of verse 9 all the way down to verse 17, and then verse 18 is set forth as a separate paragraph.
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And then a new paragraph begins with verses 19 and contains verse 20 also.
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But the NIV also has a different designation of paragraphs, and so you see that designation there.
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Verses 16 through 18 is set forth in a different paragraph from the others. Now, I put also a photocopy of the
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Greek text here. I know none of us, you know, probably know Greek, but you can see the paragraph designation here, and that's what
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I wanted to point out. So aside from those English translations, the editors of the modern
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Greek New Testament place their paragraph divisions in this way. I just dove right into the middle of the paragraph with verse 15.
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It's not indented, of course. It continues down through verse 18. And then a new paragraph begins with verse 19 and continues through verse 20.
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And so here you have different paragraph designations. They connect verses 16 through 18 with the previous paragraph or context.
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And I think if I were to, you know, express a preference, I would say that the way that the editors of the modern
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Greek text were best in their designation of paragraph divisions.
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In fact, I think this should be preferred particularly over the New King James Version as it set forth, particularly in the
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Reformation Study Bible. And of course, my favorite study Bible is the Reformation Study Bible. It's wonderful.
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However, here in the Reformation Study Bible, the New King James Version, they put a subheading right before verse 16.
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They not only divide it up as a different paragraph, they set it apart as like an entirely different subject.
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And I think that actually lends to confusion and the inability to see the connection between say verse 15 and earlier and verse 16 that follows.
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And had I noticed these differences last week when I was studying it, then we would have continued our study if we had time through verse 18, because verses 16 through 18 really go well with the previous idea.
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Well, I just pointed it out to show you that it matters how translations are ordered according to their sentence structure and paragraph structure.
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And when they are set apart in paragraph division, sometimes that doesn't necessarily lend itself to clear understanding.
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And so we're gonna attempt to address this. And so I wanna read the passage again.
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I'm gonna use the New King James Version because that's the translation I prefer here because of its style, its vocabulary.
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And yet we're gonna use a different paragraph division. And as we read this now, hopefully you'll be see the connection from one sentence to the other.
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The man departed and told the Jews that it was Jesus who had made him well. For this reason, the
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Jews persecuted Jesus and sought to kill him because he had done these things on the Sabbath. But Jesus answered them, my father has been working until now and I have been working.
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And therefore the Jews sought all the more to kill him because he not only broke the Sabbath, but also said that God was his father making himself equal with God.
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Then Jesus answered and said to them, and then we begin this prolonged discourse. This is the third discourse.
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Most assuredly I say to you, the son can do nothing of himself, but what he sees the father do.
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For whatever he does, the son also does in like manner. For the father loves the son and shows him all things that he himself does.
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And he will show him greater works than these that you may marvel. For as the father raises the dead and gives life to them, even so the son gives life to whom he will.
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For the father judges no one, but has committed all judgment to the son that all honor, that all should honor the son just as they honor the father.
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He who does not honor the son does not honor the father who sent him.
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Let's first consider the wonder of these words before us. There is a depth here.
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An insight into the nature of God and the Trinity and the way God works in history is quite amazing, quite profound, and yet not easily recognized.
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And the relevance and importance is not easily recognized. J .C. Ryle wrote of these words of our
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Lord. These verses begin one of the most deep and silent passages of the four Gospels. They show us the
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Lord Jesus asserting his own divine nature, his unity with God the
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Father, and the high dignity of his office. Nowhere does our Lord dwell so fully on these subjects as in the chapter before us.
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And nowhere, we must confess, do we find out so thoroughly the weakness of man's understanding.
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There is much we must all feel that is far beyond our comprehension in our
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Lord's account of himself. Such knowledge, in short, is too wonderful for us.
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It is high we cannot attain it, as the psalmist wrote. How often men say they want clear explanations of such doctrines as the
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Trinity, and yet here we have our Lord handling the subject of his own person and behold, we cannot follow him.
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We seem to only to touch his meaning with the tip of our fingers. And I certainly felt that way as reading through this and knowing
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I have to stand before you and try and give the honor due to it and understanding to it.
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So that's what we'll attempt to do. First, of course, we read the persecution of Jesus by the
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Jewish leaders in verses 15 through 18. Of course, all the opposition to Jesus during his earthly ministry, of course, was groundless.
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Those who accused him did so falsely, but they were ignorant of their folly and their error.
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They had certain religious perceptions and understandings by which they assessed the world about them, as do all religious people of any religion.
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They thought that they were seeing things rightly, that they were judging matters according to the will of God, but they were sorely mistaken how wrong they were, but they didn't know it.
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They thought that they were serving God and pleasing God, but again, they were sorely mistaken.
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Religious zeal without truth as its foundation is not only errant, but it's murderous.
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And we see that played out in our world today, don't we? Zeal is good if it's zeal according to truth, to knowledge.
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Zeal not according to the truth is dangerous, can even be deadly.
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Jesus healed this man who'd been lame for 38 years, but he had done so on a Sabbath day.
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And the Jews would press their case against anyone who would dare do such a thing. They didn't rejoice in this man's misery of 38 years being relieved, but rather they condemned
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Jesus because he did it on the Sabbath day. Of course, the Jewish leaders did not know the identity of the one who healed this man.
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The man himself did not know the identity of his benefactor. But then later, Jesus found this man in the temple.
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And the Lord sharply admonished him, See, you've been made well. Sin no more, lest a worse thing come upon you.
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And then the man immediately went to the Jewish leaders and said, It was Jesus who healed me.
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And so we read in verse 15, The man departed, told the Jews it was Jesus who had made him well.
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And the result was that the Jews persecuted Jesus and sought to kill him.
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Incredible. Verse 16, For this reason, the Jews persecuted Jesus, sought to kill him, because he had done these things on the
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Sabbath. Of course, there were long -observed laws respecting what was permissible on the
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Sabbath day. We rehearsed those last week. We won't do so today. And of course, many of these laws, so -called, respecting the
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Sabbath day, were not in the Old Testament Scriptures, but they were rather interpretations or extrapolations of rabbis' opinions about how to follow the
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Mosaic law. And so, when these Jews accused Jesus of breaking the
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Sabbath, Jesus here did not attempt to defend himself by citing true laws of the
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Sabbath day over against their false laws of keeping the Sabbath. Now, he gave that argument elsewhere when he was accused falsely of violating the
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Sabbath, but he didn't do so here. Rather, here, Jesus acknowledged that he had been working on the
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Sabbath, but that he had only been doing what God his Father had been doing throughout the history of the world.
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And so, he uses this account, actually, to show his union and his deity and his association with the
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Father and how they are one with one another in working providence through history.
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And so, we read of his response in verse 17, Jesus answered them, My Father has been working until now, and I have been working.
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That is a very profound statement of Jesus. To accuse
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Jesus of breaking the Sabbath would be the same as accusing God the Father of breaking the Sabbath, is what he's saying.
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Of course, the Sabbath day had its origin in the Genesis account of creation. God created all things in six days, and then he rested the seventh day.
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That was the first Sabbath day in the history of the world. And so, we read of this in Genesis 2,
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Thus the heavens and the earth and all the host of them were finished. And on the seventh day
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God ended his work which he had done. He rested on the seventh day from all his work which he had done. And then
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God blessed the seventh day and sanctified it, because in it he rested from all his work which
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God had created and made. God had completed his creation of the heavens and the earth on the sixth day.
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He ceased from his work on the seventh day. Of course, illustrating and giving an example for us, we ought to rest one day at seven, obviously.
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And when people violate that Sabbath principle, they do to their own detriment. When it records that God rested from his work, it was saying that God rested from his work of creating.
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Not that he rested from all his work, but just from his work of creating.
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He created everything in six days. And of course, his rest was not one of recuperation.
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God was not worn out from creating. It was with really no strain of effort whatsoever.
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It was just with his word and it happened. He could have created the universe twice as large as it is without any more difficulty than what he has created.
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He's infinite in his power. His rest, rather, was a time of his joyous reflection and enjoyment of all that he created.
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He delighted in what he had created in six days of creation. But God is not only the creator of all things,
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God is the governor or the provider of all things. And his work of providence, and you associate that word providence with the idea provider.
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His work of providence continued on that first Sabbath day and through every day and night since the original creation.
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And Jesus was making that declaration. My father's been working and I'm working. God has never rested from working.
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He rested from his work of creation, but even on that first Sabbath day, he was guiding and governing his creation.
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He was holding everything together. He was ordering everything that took place on that day and every day since.
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And so Jesus declared the ongoing ceaseless activity of the father, even on the Sabbath day.
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Again, it's declared in verse 17. But Jesus answered them, my father has been working until now.
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Jesus indicated his father had been continuously working. And actually, although the
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New King James Version translates the verb in the past tense, my father has been working, the
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Greek text is actually present tense. Jesus was saying, my father is working and I am working.
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And that's the emphasis, the present tense. My father is working until now and then
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I am working. And here the ESV has it right or the NIV has it right in emphasizing a present action that Jesus was describing as the work of the father.
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Not just past, but present. He is working. And that's what Jesus is saying to them.
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God is always at work on the Sabbath day. But in verse 17, he not only declares, my father has been working until now, but he also declared,
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I have been working. The father has been working and I have been working. And again, just as the
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ESV and the NIV rightly translated the Greek verb as God continuously working, so those two translations correctly convey the
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Greek verb in this clause. Jesus said that he is continuously working.
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Not had been, not was, but is. Had it said
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Jesus had been working, one might attribute his working to his pre -incarnation before he, you know, assumed a human nature and became one with us.
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He was not declaring that. He's saying, and I am working even in, as he was speaking to those people, he was talking about doing the same works as his father.
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In other words, governing providence. Governing his creation. Just as the father is providentially controlling every detail in every person's life in every way throughout every day, so was, or we would better say, so is
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Jesus. Jesus healing this lame man and commanding him to take up his bed and walk was simply
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God his father working and he along with his father working to bring to pass God's eternal decree.
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It was God's work of providence that Jesus was accomplishing, working in conjunction with his father.
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Even though God was incarnate in the Son of God, even during his incarnation, while ministering on earth, his divine nature, the divine nature of Jesus Christ was working with God the father in governing the providence of this world.
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That's an amazing thing to consider. Jesus Christ is eternal
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God. Even the eternally begotten Son of God from eternity. And so even when the divine nature embodied fully
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Jesus on earth, having joined his human nature unto his eternal, his divine nature, he was not limited to the human body of Jesus, that is his divine nature.
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His divine nature continued to preserve and direct the entire creation in its course to fulfill the eternal decree of God.
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Although the divine nature fully dwelt in the human nature, the body and soul of Jesus, his divine nature as the eternal
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Son of God was not limited to the human body of Jesus. His divine nature was still omnipresent, omniscient, omnipotent spirit existing everywhere, fully sustaining and directing his creation according to the eternal decree of the triune
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God. His father is working and he is working. That is an amazing statement on the part of Jesus.
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And you can imagine how that must have troubled the Jews. Jesus is basically saying
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I am along with my father controlling, governing everything that is transpiring in the world, in history, in the lives, day after day.
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That wasn't in his human nature but his divine nature. So when
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Jesus spoke of God working he was referring to God's ongoing work of providence, his sustaining and controlling of his creation in his day to day existence.
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God didn't create and then stand back like a man, you know, makes a watch, winds it up and lets it run on its own.
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God created and then he governs. And this is what his providence is.
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He is governing his creation through history unto its appointed end. He governs and controls his creation in its day to day existence.
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It may be argued that God the father was even working on that first Sabbath day. That is in respect to his ongoing preservation and governance of his creation.
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Otherwise things would fall apart. God's work of providence has never known a pause or break in time.
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God not only created all things but he also controls or governs all things that transpire in history.
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And so Jesus points to the unceasing activity of the father. Without him this whole created universe would cease.
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Unless he works continually no man could survive. And because of his close relationship with the father
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Jesus works in the same way. The Sabbath cannot interfere with the work of such a one.
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More specifically what do we mean by divine providence? Providence is God bringing to pass in history his decree established in eternity.
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In our confession of faith there is a statement about the providence of God. And so the statement reads this way.
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God the good creator of all things in his infinite power and wisdom does uphold, direct, dispose, and govern all creatures and things from the greatest even to the least by his most wise and holy providence to the end for which they were created according unto his infallible foreknowledge and the free and immutable or unchangeable counsel of his own will to the praise of the glory of his wisdom, power, justice, infinite goodness and mercy.
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That's a good statement on what the Bible teaches about providence. Understanding God's providence should bring great comfort and encouragement to the people of God.
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Here's Charles Spurgeon's words on the benefit or understanding of God's providence should bring to us as Christians.
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This thought of the directness of the divine operations must be carried into providence. It will greatly comfort you if you can see
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God's hand in your losses and crosses. Amen? Surely you will not murmur against the direct agency of your
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God. This will put an extraordinary sweetness into daily mercies and make the comforts of life more comfortable still because they are from a
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Father's hand. If your table is scantily furnished, it shall suffice for your contented heart when you know that your
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Father spread it for you in wisdom and love. This shall bless your bread and your water.
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This shall make the bare walls of an ill -furnished room as resplendent as a palace and turn a hard bed into a couch of down.
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I wish I could think and speak that way. My Father does it all. We see
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His smile of love even when others see nothing but the black hand of death smiling our best beloved, smiting our best beloved, speaking about the cross.
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We see a Father's hand when the pestilence lays our cattle dead upon the plain. We see
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God at work in mercy when we ourselves are stretched upon the bed of languishing. It is ever our
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Father's act and deed. Do not let us get beyond this, but rather let us enlarge our view of this truth of God and remember that this is true of the little as well as the great.
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Let the lines of a true poet strike you. If pestilence stalks through the land, you say the
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Lord has done it. Has He not done it when an aphid creeps upon the rosebud? If an avalanche tumbles from its alp, you tremble at the will of providence.
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Is not that will as much concern when the seer leaves fall from the poplar, that is the poplar tree?
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Let your heart sing of everything, Jehovah Shema, the Lord is there. And this is how we ought to understand
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God at work. You know, most of the evangelical world doesn't see
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God in this way, sadly. Or if they do, they don't see it in reality.
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They talk about running here and there to find, because they want God to intervene. They want to see
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God work. Jesus is saying, God the Father's always working and so am I. Everything that happens falls out according to God's eternal decree.
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And thankfully, He's committed for it to turn out for His glory and for your good, ultimately. Although we'll never see it, you know, fully this side of glory.
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Yet even though our Lord Jesus was affirming His glorious consoling doctrine of God's providence and His own part in bringing it to pass, it angered the
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Jewish leaders to move to desire to murder Him. Jesus answered the charge of breaking the
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Sabbath with the assertion that He was working along with His Father who was also working on the Sabbath day.
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So again, verse 17. Jesus responds. Jesus answered that My Father is working until now and I am working.
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We read that the Jews reacted angrily to Jesus when He called God My Father in verse 17.
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When Jesus spoke intimately of God as My Father, He was claiming something no other Jew would have ever dared to do so.
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As one wrote, the expression My Father is noteworthy. It was not the way Jews usually referred to God.
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Usually they spoke of Our Father and while they might use My Father in prayer, they would qualify it within Heaven or some other expression to remove the suggestion of familiarity.
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Jesus did no such thing here or elsewhere. He habitually thought of God as in the closest relationship of Himself.
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The expression implies a claim which the Jews did not miss. In other words, they knew what
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He was saying and that's why they wanted to kill Him. And so we read of their reaction in verse 18.
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Therefore the Jews sought all the more to kill Him because He not only broke the Sabbath but also said that God was
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His Father making Himself equal with God. And so the Jews immediately saw the implication of what
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Jesus was saying. He called God My Father and this just added another reason to kill
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Him. He not only broke the Sabbath but He was guilty of blasphemy claiming to be equal with God.
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As one wrote, The Jews did not miss the significance of Jesus' words.
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He had called God His own Father and this meant He was making Himself equal with God. Jesus was not teaching men that God is the
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Father of all. The Jews would have accepted this. He was claiming that God was
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His Father in a special sense. He was claiming that He partook of the same nature as His Father.
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This involved equality. And so the Jews held that He was guilty of blasphemy as well as Sabbath breaking.
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They discerned that the Sabbath breaking was no isolated rootless phenomenon. It proceeded from Jesus' view of His person and was consistent with it.
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But to them it was nothing less than blasphemy. It led them to unremitting efforts.
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And in parentheses sought is in the continuous tense. In other words, in the text where it says and they sought to kill
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Him. The emphasis in the Greek tense is that it was continuous. They didn't just seek to kill
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Him then. They were bent on doing this. They were seeking how to kill Him to secure
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His death. And so in their minds Jesus was the most evil of all people. He was not only a
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Sabbath breaker, worse He was a blasphemer. They were convinced He was deserving of death and He was to be shamed in His death due to His great sin.
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And hence the death of the cross. Again as one wrote, they immediately understood that Jesus claimed for Himself deity in the highest possible sense of that term.
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That claim was either the most wicked blasphemy to be punished with death or else it was the most glorious truth to be accepted by faith.
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The very character of the sign which Jesus had just now performed should have caused these religious leaders to adopt the latter alternative.
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Instead they chose the former. And so the Jews understood clearly the implication of Jesus' words.
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He was claiming equality with God the Father. Here we have the deity of the Lord Jesus set before us.
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Now there are those and I'm thinking of Jehovah's Witnesses in particular but there are others, other cults too that claim that Jesus is the
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Son of God but that doesn't mean that He is God the Son. But here we see the deity of Jesus.
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They did not take that view that He was the Son of God but not God the Son. They immediately understood this idea of Sonship meant equality with God the
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Father. They knew the implication of His words. Jesus was asserting that He was
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God and the Jews understood exactly what Jesus was claiming for Himself. And I would argue if Jesus wasn't claiming to be
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God Himself and it was a misunderstanding on the part of the Jews Jesus would have immediately corrected them and told them you misunderstand
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I'm not claiming to be God but they understood exactly what He was claiming to be that He was
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God Incarnate the Second Person of the Blessed Holy Trinity. Now actually that little discourse there between them leads up to this major speech of Jesus this third discourse and it begins with verse 19 and continues all the way to verse 47 obviously we're not going to get that far
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I hope that we can get from verses 19 to verse 23. And so here we have
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Jesus expressing oneness with the Father in the purpose and in the work that He had performed and would perform in history.
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So we're going to read these verses and then we'll work through each verse as to what it means and its implications.
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Jesus answered and said to them most assuredly I say to you the Son can do nothing of Himself but what
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He sees the Father do. For whatever He does the Son also does in like manner.
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For the Father loves the Son and shows Him all things that He Himself does and He will show
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Him greater works than these that you may marvel. For as the Father raises the dead and gives life to them even so the
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Son gives life to whom He will. For the Father judges no one but has committed all judgment to the
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Son that all should honor the Son just as they honor the Father. He who does not honor the
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Son does not honor the Father who sent Him. Verse 19 we read the
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Son of God does what the Father does. Again verse 19
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Then Jesus answered and said to them most assuredly verily
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I say to you He doesn't repeat the verily here but verily I say to you most assuredly the
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Son can do nothing of Himself but what He sees the Father do for whatever He does the Son also does in like manner.
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The Jewish leaders had accused Jesus of blaspheming God and breaking His Sabbath ordinance and Jesus declared this to be a false charge for the
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Son can do nothing of Himself. It's not possible that the Son think or act independently or in cross purposes with His Father.
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They do the same things. The Father and the Son have the same desires the same goals the same plans.
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They work together in perfect harmony and coordination. Here we see the divine persons of the
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Father and the Son manifesting different properties however and this is important. The Father and the
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Son are God. We're not talking about Trinity here we're talking about God the
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Father is divine the Son of God is divine and there is of course one God the
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Holy Spirit also divine. However here we see a difference between God the
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Father and God the Son. Not in essence but in the way they manifest themselves in their works.
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And so here we see the divine persons of the Father and the Son manifesting different properties.
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This is very important to distinguish between the persons of the Trinity. In other words even though the
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Father and the Son are two persons of the one true God and he's but one living and true
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God even though this one God manifests himself in three co -eternal co -equal persons nevertheless there are some things that distinguish
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God the Father from God the Son and from God the Holy Spirit and it's suggested here.
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These differences are not in essence they are of the same essence. There is only one
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God but there are differences in their roles and the manner in which they manifest their
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Godhead. Our confession of faith states it rightly. Talking about God and the
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Trinity. In this divine and infinite being say there's one God there are three subsistences the
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Father, the Word, or Son and the Holy Spirit. One substance power, eternity each having the whole divine essence yet the essence undivided.
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One God co -equal persons of the Trinity and then I emboldened and italicized the distinctiveness between the persons of the
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Trinity. The Father is of none. In other words the
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Bible never speaks of the Father being of the Son or from the Son or the Spirit. Never.
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Neither begotten nor proceeding. Nowhere in the Bible does it say God the Father was begotten or proceeding from the
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Trinity. It does refer to the Son that way and refers to the Spirit as proceeding.
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The Son is eternally begotten of the Father. It never says that of the Father it's only said of the
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Son. The Holy Spirit proceeding from the Father and the Son. All infinite without beginning therefore but one
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God who is not to be divided in nature and being but listen to this but distinguished by several in other words a couple different or peculiar that is unique relative the way they relate to one another properties and personal relations which doctrine of the
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Trinity is the foundation of all our communion with God and comfortable dependence on Him.
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And so there are differences in the role and working of the three persons of the
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Holy Trinity. So these emboldened words describe the distinctions the distinctions between the
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Father and Son are set forth say in John 5 19 The Son does what
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He sees the Father do. This claim can never be reversed it never never do you read in the
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Bible the Father does what He sees the Son do. It's the
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Son does what He sees the Father does. It can never be said the
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Father does whatever He sees the Son do. Here's a good setting forth of this distinction. Though He's the unique Son of God and may truly be called
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God and take to Himself divine titles and is in this context divine rights yet He's always submissive to His Father.
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But He can do only what He sees His Father doing. In this sense the relationship between the
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Father and the Son is not reciprocal. In other words you can't say the
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Father acts and reacts in the same way the Son does. It doesn't go both ways. It is inconceivable that John could say that the
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Father does only what He sees the Son doing. That would be preposterous not only in the cultural understanding of Father -Son relationships but also in John's understanding of the relationship between Jesus and His Heavenly Father.
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The Father initiates, sends, commands, commissions, grants. The Son responds, obeys, performs
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His Father's will, receives authority. There's distinctions between the Father and the
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Son. And in this sense the Son is the Father's agent though as John goes on to insist much more than an agent.
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So, what we're having here is some finer declarations and distinctions in our understanding of the
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Blessed Holy Trinity. It's very important. You know, we're here to know
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God to learn of Him. This is eternal life that they may know Thee, Father, and Your Son. And, so these are not just loftily unattached, you know, doctrines, but they are very relevant.
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And they have implications, far reaching implications for how we think about God and how we live day by day.
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And, just as we opened up, you know, as we read through these things and we attempt to understand them, you really can't get at them.
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We really can't understand the full implications of these things, but they're far reaching.
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The last clause of verse 19 begins with the English word for. And, that actually, actually the next three clauses follow beginning with that word for.
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And for is a conjunction. And it's an explanatory conjunction. In other words, the word for introduces an explanation.
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And that's why it should all be seen as one paragraph. For example, here, he makes the statement, and then he gives the reasons why.
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This is the reason for. And so, he reasons in verse 20, that the
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Father loves the Son and shows Him what He does. Verse 20, for the
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Father loves the Son, shows Him all things that He Himself does, and He will show Him greater works than these that you may marvel.
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Again, the sentence begins with the word for. After John declared the
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Son does everything that He sees the Father do, here we read the explanation of how it is that the
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Son can do this. John stated that the Father shows His Son all things that He Himself is doing.
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Here, by the way, I believe, we have set before us an important aspect of biblical love in a relationship, in the relationship of the
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Trinity, and it's a model and instructive for our human relationships as well.
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The Father loves His Son and therefore communicates to His Son, showing Him all things.
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Do you see that connection? Here also, we see the love of the Father and the
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Son manifested in different ways. Whereas the love of the Son toward the Father is shown in His obedience to the
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Father in all things, the love of the Father to the Son is the Father disclosing to His Son all things that He was doing.
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So there's a distinction between the Father and the Son. You see that? This is quite an important matter, the knowledge of God's will, of His purposes in history, and how
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He's accomplishing that will, and it brings us into a deeper, more significant understanding of our relationship with God, the blessed
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Holy Trinity. And moreover, we're instructed what it is to love and how to love through the example and illustration of the love between God the
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Father and God the Son. This instructs us on how to live and relate to one another, particularly in the marriage relationship.
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D. A. Carson wrote this way, If the Father out of love for His Son shows Him all He does, and the
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Son in consequence and out of love for His Father obeys Him perfectly and does whatever the Father does, such that people observe the
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Son and wonder at what He does, then two important truths follow. First, the
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Son, by His obedience to the Father, is acting in such a way that He's revealing the Father, doing the
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Father's deeds, performing the Father's will. The Son is exegeting or narrating the
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Father by His obedience. Secondly, this marvelous disclosure of the nature and character of God utterly depends in the first instance not on God's love for us, but on the love of the
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Father for the Son and the love of the Son for the Father. The same theme is developed in chapters 14 through 17.
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The achievement of the divine self -disclosure in Jesus, climaxed at the cross, was supremely the outflow of the reciprocal love of the
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Father and the Son within the Godhead. Or put in a different way, the relationship between God the
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Father and God the Son informs us and instructs us on not only how to relate to Him, but how we are to relate to one another.
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This is what our confession essentially says, as we read earlier, but now we'll read again giving emphasis on the last sentence rather than the middle ones, which we did earlier.
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In this divine and infinite being there are three subsistences, the Father, the Word, or Son, and the
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Holy Spirit of one substance, power, eternity, each having the whole divine essence, yet the essence undivided.
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The Father is of none, neither begotten nor proceeding. The Son is eternally begotten of the
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Father, the Holy Spirit proceeding from the Father and the Son, all infinite without beginning, and therefore one
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God who is not to be divided in nature and being, but is distinguished by several peculiar relative properties and personal relations, and then here it is, which doctrine of the
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Trinity is the foundation of all our communion with God and comfortable dependence upon Him.
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Our communion with God is based upon our understanding of the relationship of God the
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Father to the Son and the Son to God the Father. And again,
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I would say, it also instructs us on how to have good relationships with one another.
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Verse 21, the Son imparts life just as does the Father. Again, verse 21 reads, with this explanatory conjunction, for as the
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Father raises the dead, gives life to them, even so the Son gives life to whom He will. This is a further explanation of all that's stated in verses 19 through 20.
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The best way in which the Son does all that the Father shows Him is that in just as the Father raises the dead, so also the
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Son gives life, and that life the Son gives to anyone He wills to give life.
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If you have spiritual life, if you have eternal life, it's because the Son willed to give it to you.
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In the Old Testament, the ability to give life to the dead was understood as God's prerogative only. For example, when the
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Syrian king sent Naaman, his general, beloved general, who had leprosy, you know, the handmaiden in Naaman's household, the
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Israelite girl. Oh, if my master were only in Israel, there's a man there that could heal him of his leprosy.
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And so the king of Syria, of course, sent Naaman to the king of Israel saying, heal my servant
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Naaman of his leprosy. And, of course, the king of Israel thought that he was, you know, trying to incite a war with him.
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And the king of Israel's response was this way, 2 Kings 5, 7. It happened when the king of Israel read the letter that he tore his clothes and said, am
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I God to kill and make alive? Only God could kill and make alive, can cause a man to come forth from the dead.
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Am I God that I can heal this man of leprosy? Well, here Jesus not only claims to have the ability to give life to the dead, but that he has the authority to do so as he wills to give it.
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This authority to raise the dead will be manifest, of course, on the last day when he raises all the dead from the graves.
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But it's also true even in history when he gives spiritual life to dead sinners.
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Jesus, as Lord, as king, issues the edict to a dead sinner live and spiritual life, regeneration takes place, a new birth takes place and before long, in short order, that person becomes a humble, repentant, believing
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Christian. Because the Lord Jesus had the power and the will and the desire to raise that person to life.
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He wills to give it. And next week we'll see how this ability of Jesus is manifest in giving spiritual resurrection to sinners.
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Fourthly, we read the father has entrusted the judgment of mankind to his son, verse 22.
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Again, the sentence begins with the conjunction for, explanatory, for the father judges no one but has committed all judgment to the son.
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That all should honor the son just as they honor the father. Not only has the father trusted his son with giving life, both spiritual and physical, both temporal and eternal, but the father has also given the son authority to judge the world.
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On the last day when all the world is brought before his throne to be judged according to their works, King Jesus will be that judge on that throne.
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And even though verse 22 is parallel with verse 21 in that the son is declared to have authority, there is a difference.
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In verse 21, just as the father gives life, so the son does. But in verse 22 we read that the father judges no one but has entrusted it all to his son.
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And so again, although these two persons, the father and the son, are equal in essence and works, it's through judgment being entrusted to the son that God the father assures the son is going to be honored just like he is.
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All are going to honor the son. Nothing could bring honor to Jesus Christ more than the father designating him to be the judge of all humanity on the last day.
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That elevates him a little bit, doesn't it? Every human being that lives is going to have to stand before King Jesus one day and give an account of every word they spoke, every attitude they exhibited, every attitude they've shown, every thought that's coursed through their minds, every action they've ever done.
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You're going to have to stand and answer to King Jesus. That gives them some honor. I gave a couple passages that speak of that.
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Of course, we won't read that. And so this passage, it's incredible in its depth in revealing to us who the son of God is and what he's like and how he relates to the father and how he is the one who governs providence along with the father through history.
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And then lastly, of course, we read the father is honored by those who honor his son. This one statement here in verse 23b distinguishes
01:00:44
Christianity from all other religions of the world. And it not only sets forth
01:00:49
Christianity as above them all, it declares every other religion a false religion.
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It's a summary as well as a declaration in terms of a climax to the entire episode. The whole stress of this present passage is on the unity of the father and the son.
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He who does not honor the son does not honor the father who sent him. God received no honor from anyone unless they honor his son,
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Jesus Christ. The only way that God is ordained that he could be honored by a human being is through honoring the son that the father is sent to be the savior and the judge of the world.
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We attempt to exalt Jesus Christ and we know that to the degree we do, we are exalting and glorifying
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God the father as well. Because they're one and the same. They're doing the same things.
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And the son has glorified the father and we glorify the father when we glorify the son.
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Let's just run through these short words of application and then we'll close.
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First, recognize God is always at work and maintaining the world even as he governs the course of all events.
01:02:04
God's providence should be a great cause of comfort and joy for the Christian. We're not living in a world that's characterized by chaos and meaninglessness.
01:02:15
God has created this world and all that's in it for a purpose and this is to glorify himself and so that his people would enjoy him forever.
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Secondly, we should not think that God is not involved in the daily events of the world in which we live. The world at times appears to be chaotic, meaningless, morass of evil mixed and yet thankfully there's times and causes for joy and happiness.
01:02:40
Yes, there are times when God seems to intervene in special and remarkable ways and yet we should recognize the ordinary events that fall out daily in our lives as the working of God's providence and we should be grateful and thankful for them.
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Thirdly, we should have a sympathetic, we recognize we have a sympathetic high priestly king who rules over history on behalf of God the
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Father for our benefit and the eternal well -being of his people. He is a high priest after the
01:03:10
Order of Melchizedek which means he's not only our high priest but he's also our king. Melchizedek was a king priest.
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Again, governing all things as well as intervening for us within the accessory ministry.
01:03:25
Fourthly, let us give regard to the glory of Jesus Christ seeking to exalt him by presenting him according to the truth and living according to his laws.
01:03:34
We do honor God the Father most when we honor the Son best. And then fifth, we do not honor our
01:03:43
Lord Jesus or his Father by our murmuring and complaining of his providential work in our lives. Every one of us needs to be reminded of this continually.
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Ever complaining about other people or about things that occur to us is murmuring against the Lord who has revealed to us that he is ordering our lives ultimately for our good and his glory.
01:04:04
Complaining, bitterness, angry outbursts do not honor the Lord. Every complaint against a providential event is a defiance and resistance to the
01:04:13
Lord who has ordered all things. There's some practicality for us.
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Sixth, we are to have patience in knowing the Lord Jesus is going to execute judgment according to righteousness when he returns on the last day.
01:04:28
Therefore, we are to be patient as to the coming of the Lord when justice will be fully administered.
01:04:35
Seventh, let us be mindful that each of us will one day stand before King Jesus and be judged according to the deeds done by us in this life.
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We'll be assessed whether or not we've sought God's forgiveness through faith in Jesus Christ alone even as we seek to show forth our faith through acts of love and righteousness.
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But eighth, as Christians, let us not be afraid of that day that is coming when Jesus will call us before his judgment seat.
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He's able and will most certainly present his people before himself as blameless. He's not only the judge, but he's the defense attorney, isn't he, the advocate.
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And therefore, there is no condemnation for them that are in Christ Jesus. We need not fear the last judgment.
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In fact, we'll welcome it because our lives will testify that we are believers. Ninth, let us tell forth the full gospel of Jesus Christ that he is
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God, the Father's beloved and eternal Son and whom the Father has entrusted all authority in heaven and earth.
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Jesus Christ is Lord and so let us believe on him, submit unto him and follow him. And tenth, even as we witness of the gospel of Jesus Christ, we are to pray that the
01:05:47
Lord should impart life to whom we bear witness. He only can do that. The Father's entrusted all authority to him in heaven and earth.
01:05:58
Only Jesus Christ can raise the spiritually dead person to spiritual life. And then last, let us rejoice in God having revealed to us the glory of his
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Son that we have a rich, glorious, and bliss -filled eternity before us.
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Let us be at peace with him and with one another in this knowledge in the light of his promises to us.
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The glory of Christ, coming to know him is transformative, isn't it? Coming to know him better will enable us to live better as well and relate better with one another.
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May the Lord help us do so. Let's pray. Father, thank you for your word. Thank you for this gospel of John in which we read of these wonderful, glorious truths.
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Help us, our Lord, to see the relevance of it and help us to go forth with Christ, Lord, and live in the light of it.
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And so help us, fill us with the Holy Spirit, our God, we who know you. And then, Lord, if there's anyone here that came to this place this morning, a non -Christian, we pray that you would stir that soul,
01:07:03
Lord, and not give that person rest until he or she rests in Jesus alone as the only
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Savior of sinners. And we'll thank you and praise you for the work of grace that we see in that life.