Statement of intent
I know who I am, and what I’m going to do, said Jesus, to his distinctly hostile audience. It might be wondered if Jesus deliberately provoked a group of people to get an audience with them.
His audience was the rulers of the synagogue, and they had been provoked by that fact that Jesus healed a man who had been sick for 38 years; he had done this on their sacred Day Of Rest when no work was allowed. Worse still, he told the sick man, who had been lying on a sleeping pad, to get up, roll up his sleeping pad and walk. That made two people working on the Day of Rest, Jesus doing healing work and a healed man carrying his rolled up sleeping pad through the streets.
Jesus provoked them still further when they tried to rebuke him. “My Father is still working and I also am working.” He told them. Now the anger of the religious rulers knew no bounds Jesus must be killed, for the sin of blasphemy. He was making himself equal with God.
So Jesus had their attention. The very people who would not give him a hearing had to listen to him in an attempt to stop him doing what he was doing. Before their shocked and outraged faces Jesus declared who he is and what he intended doing.
Having identified himself as equal to God, Jesus now talks of the synergic relationship between himself and God. God the Father loves Jesus the Son and shows him what God wants him to do. Jesus has just healed a sick man but he says he will do even greater works than this, works that will astonish them. Jesus the Son, like God the Father, can raise people to life and will do so when the time is right. To dishonor Jesus the Son is to dishonor God. Jesus said this to the religious leaders who had a tendency to honor their religious laws more than they honored God.
Eternal life was one thing these people wanted; they searched the Jewish Bible eagerly looking for a way to survive beyond the grave and beyond the final judgment. Jesus tells them that it is his voice they will hear when they are in their graves, just as they are listening to him now; the same voice will call them to the resurrection. In that resurrection, says Jesus, some people will rise to eternal life and others to eternal condemnation. The way to avoid the judgment is to believe that God has sent Jesus, anyone who truly believes this has already received eternal life, even before he dies. These words of Jesus were a challenge; a man with nothing left to rely on will find it easy to rely on God, a man who has relied on his own goodness will be reluctant to give that up. Especially because putting trust in God means putting confidence in something the individual cannot control.
Jesus strove to convince the people listening to him: for their sakes, he pointed out that the miracles he was doing were evidence that God was working through him. He points out that His Father is witnessing to the validity of what he claims to be, God become human, so that humanity can see God and live. Jesus reminds them that Moses promised them a prophet and that he is the one Moses wrote about.
“You search the scriptures because you think that in them you will find eternal life, and it is the scriptures that testify about me, yet you refuse to come to me to have life.” When Jesus said this his heart was breaking, like the heart of a devoted friend who watches someone destroying himself and refusing all offers of help. To this day Jesus grieves about people who do not grieve about themselves.
The indignant religious leaders exercised their God given right: freedom of choice. they choose not to believe. Jesus told them there are two reasons why they have made this choice: 1 they don’t love God, 2 they are more concerned about what people think about them, than about what God thinks about them.
People ask; “What is faith?” They write books about it, and spend hours sitting on sidewalks drinking coffee or beer and asking, what is faith? Faith is a simple choice; a decision to believe that when said these words, Jesus was speaking the truth. Once that decision is made all the power of God rushes in, to confirm the correctness of the choice. The approval of God is experienced within a person, and the life of the ages begins.
The Gospel of John, chapter 5. verses 1 – 47
Moses: Deuteronomy chapter 18. verses 15 – 19
His audience was the rulers of the synagogue, and they had been provoked by that fact that Jesus healed a man who had been sick for 38 years; he had done this on their sacred Day Of Rest when no work was allowed. Worse still, he told the sick man, who had been lying on a sleeping pad, to get up, roll up his sleeping pad and walk. That made two people working on the Day of Rest, Jesus doing healing work and a healed man carrying his rolled up sleeping pad through the streets.
Jesus provoked them still further when they tried to rebuke him. “My Father is still working and I also am working.” He told them. Now the anger of the religious rulers knew no bounds Jesus must be killed, for the sin of blasphemy. He was making himself equal with God.
So Jesus had their attention. The very people who would not give him a hearing had to listen to him in an attempt to stop him doing what he was doing. Before their shocked and outraged faces Jesus declared who he is and what he intended doing.
Having identified himself as equal to God, Jesus now talks of the synergic relationship between himself and God. God the Father loves Jesus the Son and shows him what God wants him to do. Jesus has just healed a sick man but he says he will do even greater works than this, works that will astonish them. Jesus the Son, like God the Father, can raise people to life and will do so when the time is right. To dishonor Jesus the Son is to dishonor God. Jesus said this to the religious leaders who had a tendency to honor their religious laws more than they honored God.
Eternal life was one thing these people wanted; they searched the Jewish Bible eagerly looking for a way to survive beyond the grave and beyond the final judgment. Jesus tells them that it is his voice they will hear when they are in their graves, just as they are listening to him now; the same voice will call them to the resurrection. In that resurrection, says Jesus, some people will rise to eternal life and others to eternal condemnation. The way to avoid the judgment is to believe that God has sent Jesus, anyone who truly believes this has already received eternal life, even before he dies. These words of Jesus were a challenge; a man with nothing left to rely on will find it easy to rely on God, a man who has relied on his own goodness will be reluctant to give that up. Especially because putting trust in God means putting confidence in something the individual cannot control.
Jesus strove to convince the people listening to him: for their sakes, he pointed out that the miracles he was doing were evidence that God was working through him. He points out that His Father is witnessing to the validity of what he claims to be, God become human, so that humanity can see God and live. Jesus reminds them that Moses promised them a prophet and that he is the one Moses wrote about.
“You search the scriptures because you think that in them you will find eternal life, and it is the scriptures that testify about me, yet you refuse to come to me to have life.” When Jesus said this his heart was breaking, like the heart of a devoted friend who watches someone destroying himself and refusing all offers of help. To this day Jesus grieves about people who do not grieve about themselves.
The indignant religious leaders exercised their God given right: freedom of choice. they choose not to believe. Jesus told them there are two reasons why they have made this choice: 1 they don’t love God, 2 they are more concerned about what people think about them, than about what God thinks about them.
People ask; “What is faith?” They write books about it, and spend hours sitting on sidewalks drinking coffee or beer and asking, what is faith? Faith is a simple choice; a decision to believe that when said these words, Jesus was speaking the truth. Once that decision is made all the power of God rushes in, to confirm the correctness of the choice. The approval of God is experienced within a person, and the life of the ages begins.
The Gospel of John, chapter 5. verses 1 – 47
Moses: Deuteronomy chapter 18. verses 15 – 19
posted by Jessie Coates at 12:40 AM
0 Comments:
Post a Comment
<< Home