1 JOHN: JESUS THE SON OF GOD This morning we look at the last of the four Gospels. Before we get into it, one more bit of info about the New Testament. In case you have wondered, we do not have the original manuscripts that were written by the authors of the New Testament. What we possess are copies of copies. Sometimes people who are ill-informed or who have an agenda will say, We don t really know what the New Testament authors wrote. All we have are copies of copies produced by fallible scribes. It s true that we have copies of copies, but that s not unique to the New Testament. A few quick examples. Julius Caesar s Gallic Wars. Caesar lived from 100 to 44 BC. We have about 10 good manuscripts that remain. By manuscript we mean a hand-written copy produced before the printing press. The one closet to the time Caesar wrote it was copied 900 years after it was written The pre-eminent first century Roman historians was named Tacitus. We have only two manuscripts of his writings. One was copied 800 years and the other 1000 years after Tacitus wrote the original manuscripts. The same is true of all the ancient works we possess. All of them have been copied and recopied by fallible scribes for hundreds and hundreds of years, yet no one attacks their accuracy the way critics attack the Gospels.
2 When it comes to the New Testament, it s a remarkably different story. We have over 5700 manuscripts, partial manuscripts and fragments, coming from as early as the 2 nd and 3 rd centuries. Just to give you a feel of how amazing this is: The runner up to the New Testament is Homer s Iliad. There are approximately 650 manuscripts known today, many fragmentary. Homer composed this great work about 800 BC. The oldest manuscripts we have were copied a thousand years after Homer lived. It s true that fallible scribes copied and recopied the New Testament. The good news is that when you over 5000 manuscripts you can compare them and in every truly important case determine exactly what was originally written with a very high degree of confidence. Bruce Metzger received his Ph.D. from Princeton where he taught for 46 years. He became recognized as the pre-eminent authority on the original Greek text of the New Testament. What was his assessment of how closely what we have today compares to what was originally written? Bruce Metzger: We can have great confidence in the fidelity with which this material has come down to us, especially compared with any other ancient literary work. Rest assured that what we have today is an accurate reflection of what was written by the original New Testament authors. Old School Quest Clip
3 Today s author is John. Compared to the other Gospels, there is a simple but moving majesty to John s portrait of Jesus. Listen to John s opening lines. John 1.1-4, 14: In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. He was with God in the beginning. Through him all things were made; without him nothing was made that has been made. In him was life, and that life was the light of men. The Word became flesh and made his dwelling among us. We have seen his glory, the glory of the One and Only, who came from the Father, full of grace and truth. Mark began his Gospel with Jesus full grown, proclaiming the Kingdom of God. Matthew began with a genealogy that took Jesus back to Abraham. Luke did one better. His genealogy took Jesus back all the way to Adam. But John begins with the beginning. In fact he goes beyond the beginning, and says before the realities we refer to as space and time had come into existence, John says: Jesus was. Divine, but distinct, from the Father, he existed as the creative, powerful Word that would rush forth through the emptiness of space, speaking the cosmos into being. And without him nothing was made that has been made not an atom or a quark not a planet or a star or a galaxy. Jesus, John tells us, Jesus is Eternal God, Creator of the Cosmos, and before there was anything, in him there was life.
4 This is the one we listened to and learned from. This is the one who knelt down and washed our feet. This is the one we wept over when he was nailed to a cross. This is the one we embraced when he burst forth from the grave, victorious over death, and when we saw his face, we beheld the glory of the One and Only, sent from the Father, full of grace and truth. The theme of John s Gospel is the deity of Christ. From beginning to end, John s Gospel drives home the point: Jesus is not one of many. Jesus is the One and Only. Let s back up a moment and let me give you a little background. Who was John? The early church fathers tell us that the author of the fourth Gospel was one of the earliest disciples of Jesus. He and his brother James were fishermen. It appears that they were fiery and impetuous, because Jesus called them the Sons of Thunder. Along with Peter, they formed an inner circle of sorts who were with Jesus in his most intimate moments, moments of glory and moments of struggle. And as Jesus was dying on the cross, it was to John that Jesus entrusted the care of his mother Mary.
5 It would be hard to argue that anyone knew Jesus better than John. No one had been closer, no one had been with him more. No one had more opportunity to see whatever flaws there might have been. And, yet, no one is more clear: Jesus was and is the Son of God. John s Gospel was the last of the four to be written. Most scholars believe near 90 AD. Best guess, John would have been near 80 years old. John wrote three four others books of the New Testament. Three epistles and the Book of Revelation. John doesn t identify his primary audience, though scholars believe it was Jews living outside of Palestine. But he does tell us his purpose in writing his Gospel: John 20.30-31: Jesus did many other miraculous signs in the presence of his disciples, which are not recorded in this book. But these are written that you may believe that Jesus is the Christ, the Son of God, and that by believing you may have life in his name. There s so much more I could have included, John says. But I chose what I did, because I wanted you to know that Jesus is the Son of God, and that by faith in him, you might have life. Son of God that is John s most important title for Jesus. And you might say, but aren t we all sons and daughters of God? Let s look at the verse that is considered the heart of John s Gospel: John 3.16: For God so loved the world that he gave his only begotten Son, that whosoever believes in him should not perish but have eternal life.
6 Go back to John 1.14 and Jesus is described as the One and Only who came from the Father. The phrase only begotten and the phrase the One and Only are two different ways of translating the same Greek word which is so rich and wondrous, that no single English phrase is sufficient as a translation. It s the Greek word µονογενής (monogenas). Look at that will you. Mono means same or one. Genas is the Greek word we get our word genetics from. And what John wants us to know is that Jesus is of the same stuff as the Father, he shares the same nature, he possesses the same essence. We, you and I, are God s creatures, we are made in his image, and through faith can be graciously adopted into his family as sons. But John says, Jesus is not one of God s creatures, he is God s Son, the one and only who is of the same kind, possessing the same divine nature, and existing throughout eternity with the Father. He is monogenas. And John s goal is to present a portrait of Jesus that will enable his readers to recognize him for who he is, believe in him and have life.
7 How does he do this? He organizes his Gospel around seven miraculous signs and seven great, what we call, I am statements. The number seven in Jewish thought was a symbol of completeness or perfection. And by presenting seven great signs that Jesus performed and seven great claims that he made, John wants to completely and fully demonstrate that Jesus is the Son of God who brings us life. The first of the seven signs we find in John chapter 2. He changes water into wine at the wedding in Cana of Galilee when a couple runs out of wine for their guests. Not just a gracious act to save face for an embarrassed couple, but an intentional act a sign that Jesus had come for the purpose of conversion. Water into wine, the old into the new, sinners into saints. John 2.11: This, the first of his miraculous signs, Jesus performed in Cana of Galilee. He thus revealed his glory, and his disciples put their faith in him. The other signs John uses to display the glory of Jesus are healing the official s son (4.43-54), healing a paralyzed man (5.1-15), feeding the five thousand (6.1-15), walking on water (6.16-24) healing a man born blind (9.1-12), and raising Lazarus from the dead (11.1-44). The seven I am statements John reports as the words of Jesus about himself are: I am the bread of life (6.35), the light of the world (8.12), the gate of the sheep (10.7), the good shepherd (10.11), the resurrection and the life (11.25), the way, the truth, and the life (14.6), and the true vine (15.1).
8 In each of these seven statements, Jesus in John s Gospel presents himself as uniquely able to provide for humankind what we desperately need for life and what can be found in no one else. Amazingly, these statements of self-importance are made by One who condemned pride and arrogance in others. The great British scholar and preacher John R. W. Stott wrote: John R. W. Stott: The most striking feature of the teaching of Jesus is that he was constantly talking about himself. This self-centeredness of the teaching of Jesus immediately sets him apart from the other great religious teachers of the world. They pointed men away from themselves, saying, That is the truth so far as I perceive it; follow that. Jesus said, I am the truth; follow me. And what is perhaps even more amazing is that those who walked beside him for three years, sons of thunder like James and John, hard-headed Peter, and eventually even Thomas the skeptic rather than think his claims pretentious or absurd, they came to believe that his claims were valid and true. Seven miraculous signs. Seven great claims. Together, more than sufficient to proclaim the full deity and unique Sonship of Jesus the Christ. I want to spend the rest of our time this morning looking at one of these great I am statements that carries many of the themes of John s Gospel In John 14.6 Jesus said. John 14.6: I am the way and the truth and the life. Let s start with
9 1. I AM THE WAY. In chapter three of John s Gospel, we read about a man named Nicodemus coming to Jesus. He was a most impressive figure. He was wealthy and powerful, part of the Sanhedrin, the highest civil and religious court in Israel. He was one of the nation s leading professors. And he was a Pharisee, which meant he had committed himself to following the Jewish Law down to the last detail. He comes to Jesus and says, John 3.2: Rabbi, we know that you are a teacher from God, for no one can do these signs you do unless God is with him. Nicodemus comes to this itinerant preacher, who possesses no formal training or credentials, a man that all of his peers would have despised as uneducated, arrogant and blasphemous, and he makes this incredible statement: You are a teacher from God. Something had happened that had rocked Nicodemus world, something so real and so undeniable, that he is having to question all that he has believed. Obviously, he had seen Jesus heal the sick and perform other miracles; he had seen how Jesus embraced the unlovely; and he had heard Jesus teach, words that were so simple, yet so powerful and so profound, that his heart had been pierced and it seemed that God himself was speaking.
10 What does Jesus say to him, the very next sentence? John 3.3: I tell you the truth, no one can see the Kingdom of God unless he is born again. Jesus had a way of knowing what was in the hearts of men and women. And he knew that Nicodemus was sincere, and he knew that this revered teacher of Israel wanted more than religion and rules. And so he tells Nicodemus: you want the Kingdom of God. That s what you ve seen in me. In me you have seen what s real and lasting and beautiful and good, and you want it for yourself. And for that, you must be born a second time. Nicodemus responds in a way that anyone would. John 3.4: How can a man be born when he is old? Surely, he cannot enter a second time into his mother s womb to be born. And Jesus responds: John 3.5-6: I tell you the truth: no one can enter the Kingdom of God unless he is born of the water and the Spirit. Flesh gives birth to flesh, but the Spirit gives birth to spirit. And Nicodemus responds, how can this be? How can I be born spiritually and enter the Kingdom of God? Tell me how this can be done, map it out for me, Jesus. show me the way. To answer that question, Jesus does not give Nicodemus a philosophy to adopt or a religion to follow. He does not direct Nicodemus to a new set of teachings to believe or to a list of good deeds to perform. Instead he points Nicodemus to himself. Why because, Jesus is the way.
11 John 3.14-15: Just as Moses lifted up the snake in the desert, so the Son of Man must be lifted up, that everyone who believes in him may have eternal life. Do you remember that story from Israel s days wandering in the wilderness? The Israelites had been complaining and rebelling against God, and God sent a plague of serpents into their camp. Finally, they repented and cried out for mercy. And God told Moses to make a bronze serpent and set it on a pole in the middle of the camp. And whenever anyone was bitten, he or she was to come to the pole, look at the serpent and be healed. It s a strange story, isn t it? The people had sinned. A symbol of their sin is set high above them. And only when they come in faith and look to it are they healed. Nicodemus would have known that story. Every good Jew would. And then Jesus tells Nicodemus: God is going to do it again. I m going to be lifted up, Nicodemus. And when I am, everyone who looks to me in faith will be forgiven their sins, the poison will be removed from their souls, and they will be given a second chance at life. It s just like being born again. Who would have thought? The way to the Kingdom and to forgiveness and to God himself is not a religion or a philosophy; it s a person, and that person is Jesus Christ. And then in John s Gospel, the next verse is John 3.16: For God so loved the world that he gave his only begotten Son, that whosoever believes in him should not perish but have eternal life.
12 We find Nicodemus mentioned two other times in John s Gospel. Once when the chief priests and the Pharisees wanted to have Jesus arrested and executed, we find Nicodemus pleading that at least he be given a fair trial. And the other time, he is standing at the foot of the cross. He and another man received the dead body of Jesus, wrapped it in strips of linen, and made certain that Jesus received a proper burial. I have to wonder, don t you, if Nicodemus put it together. Standing there, looking up at that pole, staring at the body of Jesus raised above him the most graphic symbol of humanity s sin the world will ever see. I wonder if he remembered the words of Jesus: As Moses lifted up the serpent in the wilderness, so I must be lifted up that whoever believes in me may have eternal life. I wonder if he realized that his answer was not wealth or power or religion or even being moral and good. But his answer was a God who loved him enough to bear the punishment that his sins deserved and pay the debt he could never pay. I would love to believe that in that moment Nicodemus looked to Jesus in faith and was born again. But what s most important is not whether Nicodemus saw in Jesus the way into God s Kingdom, but whether you do? And whether you have looked to him in faith, and trusted him as the Son of God.
13 Sometimes people say, aren t there many ways to God? And they point to the good in other religions. Their deep philosophical teachings, their call to be kind to others, their summons to be amazed at the wonder of creation. Aren t those valid ways to God? Jesus says, no religion, no philosophy, no act of self-denial or philanthropy is the way to be made right with a holy God. I am the way. My life, my sacrifice, my death that pays for your sins and removes the poison from your heart. I am the way. The way to God is not our making our way to him. The way to God is Jesus coming to and for us. In John 14.6 Jesus also says: 2. I AM THE TRUTH. Back to John s magnificent prologue. John 1.18: No one has ever seen God, but God the One and Only, who is at the Father's side, has made him known. Some of us grew up looking forward every month to the newest edition of Life Magazine.
14 Each December the cover of Life featured a religious question that people all around the world were asked to answer. One year it was What is the soul? Another year it was Understanding the mystery of Jesus Why does it matter today? The most compelling issue was dedicated to answering the question Who is God? Pic of cover Here are a few of the answers that were given. Ramon Correa, a twenty-one-year-old thief and murderer, living in the slums of Medellin, Columbia, said: Ramon Correa: God pardons everyone who seeks him, so pretty much you can do what you want. He is very understanding. Baldeva Ram could not have had a more different understanding of God. Ram was a middle-aged beggar sitting beside the Ganges River in a wheelbarrow, his fingers and toes eaten away by leprosy. Baldeva Ram: Brahma has written out my fate. I am being punished for sins I must have committed in my last life. God is vengeful. He really punishes. Sheik Ahmed Ibrahim spent eighteen years in an Israeli prison for terrorism. Sheik Ahmed Ibrahim: I am ready to kill and be killed myself in fighting the jihad the holy war because it is Allah s wish. Killing for the jihad is a holy deed. Hollywood producer Lynda Sparrow was quoted as saying, Lynda Sparrow: I do believe in a God. But I don t know how to be a Jew, and I don t even know what my soul is. I can t make a connection with God. It s a hopeless feeling that I m all on my own. Confusing, isn t it?
15 It seems that there are as many answers as there are people. Maybe that s why one of those who responded to Life s question, a French journalist, Jean Paul Kauffmann, finished his statement with the words Jean Paul Kauffman: God is a mystery we cannot understand him or his ways. Those sound like the words of a skeptic. But they are very close to what the Bible teaches. Isaiah 55.8-9: For my thoughts are not your thoughts; neither are your ways my ways, says the Lord. For as the heavens are higher than the earth, so are my ways higher than your ways, and my thoughts than your thoughts. The idea that we can take what we know from this world and think our way to God and figure out who he is to say, Well, if there is a God, he must be like this because that makes sense to me- that will never work because his thoughts are not our thoughts. His ways are not our ways. Edwin Arlington Robinson put it well. Edwin Arlington Robinson: The world is a kind of spiritual kindergarten where millions of bewildered infants are trying to spell God with the wrong blocks. God is not simply a bigger, better one of us. He is a different kind of being. His nature transcends anything we have experienced and everything we can imagine. If we are going to understand who he is and what he expects of us, God will have to come down from where he is to where we are and he will have to do so in a way that we can comprehend. And so the Bible, Old and New Testaments, tells us that for us to know God, he must reveal himself to us.
16 But how can finite beings ever see or comprehend an infinite God. Look what Jesus says in John s Gospel. John 14.9: Anyone who has seen me has seen the Father. It s in Jesus, the monogenas, come in the flesh, that we see God for who he is. It s in Jesus we see that God is not far off and distant, but nearby and intimately concerned with our lives. It s in Jesus we see that God is not punitive and vindictive but kind and gracious. It s in Jesus we see God has a heart for the lost and the least, that he hates hypocrisy and that he will judge the powerful who care nothing for the poor. And it s in Jesus that we discover that God is more concerned with a transformed heart that with religious deeds. Jesus says, I am the truth in me, you can see who the Father is and how to live lives that please him. Jesus said: I am the way and the truth and 3. I AM THE LIFE. John 1.4: In him was life, and that life was the light of men. Deep down, people are hungry for life. We yearn for life. Not just more days on earth. But moments that are rich and real and deep. Days that are fulfilling and lives that matter.
17 In John s Gospel, chapter 6 Jesus makes a stunning claim. John 6.35: I am the bread of life. Whoever comes to me will never go hungry. The life you re hungry for. The life you re craving. The life you were made to experience Jesus say, you can find it in me. What an audacious claim Jesus is making. If you want life, real life, come to me and you will never go hungry again. Where do people look for life? What do we turn to in order to experience the feeling of being fully alive? To the same things people have always looked to. Possessions. Pleasure. Positions of power. The praise of others. We think, If I can get enough of those, then I ll have life. I won t be empty any more. My soul will be satisfied and my spirit will be at peace. Christianity makes the boldest of claims. It looks the world squarely in the face and says, You re wrong.
18 All the things you chase after, all the things you value, all the things you look to and trust in they ll never give you life. Why? Because Jesus is the bread of life. And the life you re looking for, the life you crave, the life you were created to experience cannot be found in what this world offers, but only in him. Frank was a strong man. A big man. A man s man. He was a man of character and integrity. After being downsized in one of Houston s oil downturns, he began his own company and ran it successfully until he retired. He loved his wife and he loved his kids. Some days he would leave in the morning after working all night on a well, drive all day so he could get home for one of his sons ballgames, kiss his wife good-bye when it was over, and drive back and work through the night without any sleep. Just because his family was important to him. He was the one that everyone went to for advice and his presence was the strength and the assurance they turned to when they were confused and hurting. Frank was a man of faith. He attended Quest until he became so sick with cancer that he couldn t come any more.
19 I had a conversation with him at his home less than two weeks before his death. This big, strong man was too weak to get out of his bed, so I sat beside him and bent close to hear him speak. Without any prompting from me he began to tell me about his faith. He said, When I heard the news about my cancer and how bad it was, I wasn t mad or angry. Really, I smiled. I ve had such a wonderful life, if the Lord was standing right here, there s nothing I could ask him for. He told me how he loved the woods and how he relished the times he had spent there because that s when he felt the closest to Jesus and that s where God had often spoke to him. And how he loved Christmas because it seemed at that time of the year the whole world was focused on Jesus. And he said, When I think back on the greatest joys in life, they all come back to Jesus. Teachers and religions will offer you secret wisdom and new revelations and philosophies to follow and ways to build up good karma and tricks for getting the universe to do what you desire.
20 Christianity we offer you Jesus. We are bold enough to say if you have Jesus, you will always have enough. Because he is life and what you are looking for can be found in him and only in him.