All right, open up your Bibles to the book of John.
We're going to be in John chapter 5 this morning.
We have been in John for the past four months.
We're preaching through the whole book of John verse by
verse. We're actually after this
Sunday, we're going to take a break for seven weeks and we're
going to start a new teaching series talking about the church
in more depth. And so we'll push pause on John.
And then after that series, we'll jump back into John
chapter 6. But today we're going to be
looking at chapter 5, verses 31 through 47.
If you didn't bring a Bible with you, we've got some under the
seats in front of you. Feel free to use those.
Feel free to keep one of those if you don't have a Bible and
it's page 890 in that Bible. So you're familiar with if you
have a cell phone multi factor authentication, right?
You're laughing because you don't like it, right?
It's annoying, isn't it? It requires users to provide
more than one method to verify that it's you so that you can
actually access your account. So if you're trying to log into
your bank account to see if you have enough money in your
account to get a burrito for lunch today, it's going to
authenticate. The bank wants to authenticate
that it is authentically you looking into that account.
So you have to enter your password.
And then there's some kind of biometrics thing.
It scans your retina or something.
And then it wants to send you a text message with a code because
it wants to make sure that it's actually you and your phone and
your hand. And you get the text and then
you enter it. It starts to ask you security
questions. And So what is your mother's
maiden name? And what was your first grade
school teacher's name? And who's your favorite sports
team? You have to answer them.
Those are presumably things that only you would know.
You have to complete a puzzle to prove that you're actually a
human and not some kind of robot.
And then you have to click the boxes that have the bridge or
the motorcycle or the stoplight in them.
And then now you can finally see your pathetically low checking
account and realize you're having ramen for lunch.
You're not going to Chipotle. But all of that works together
so that you can prove that you really are who you say that you
are and not some hacker in Sweden or the Netherlands or
something like that. In the text that we're looking
at today, Jesus is doing the same thing, but 2000 years
before iPhones. He is doing this to prove to
skeptics that he is who he says he is.
He is seeking to authenticate his identity.
Last week we read a story a couple weeks over the past
couple weeks about Jesus healing a cripple on the Sabbath.
The Jewish leaders were upset because you weren't supposed to
do that kind of thing on the Sabbath.
And so Jesus is breaking Jewish tradition.
Jesus comes back at them and he says, hey, I have authority to
do that because I'm God, right? This is he's starting to claim
his true identity. The Jewish leaders are very
upset and they begin to persecute him.
Jesus pushes back against them. If you were here last week, I
taught on those verses where Jesus claims to be one with the
Father in activity and purpose and love, in giving life to the
dead and in judgment. And he tells them they they owe
him honor, worship because he is God.
And then we ended last week on verse 30 where Jesus says you
can look at it with me. Chapter 5, verse 30, He says I
can do nothing on my own as I hear I judge and my judgment is
just because I seek not my own will, but the will of him who
sent me. So he's basically saying I'm not
some madman with a God complex. What I'm doing is right because
I am one with the Father, right? I am God in the flesh.
And so today Jesus is continuing his argument with these leaders
and he presents four factors to them or 4 witnesses to them to
authenticate to these hard hearted religious leaders that
Jesus is in fact who he says he is.
He is God in the flesh. So my hope for us today is that
we would all realize that if you're a Christian here, if
you're not a Christian here, that Jesus says he proves that
he is who he says he is in multiple ways.
If you're not a follower of Jesus, realize that.
Excuse me? If you are a follower of Jesus,
realize that your faith is built on a bona fide Savior who really
is God, and you can trust him because he is who he says he is.
So I want to give us a brief moment of silence before we read
God's Word. And so I want to encourage you
during this 10 or 15 seconds of silence to just quiet your
hearts, humble your hearts. You may whisper a little prayer
to God just to ask Him to give you open ears and open eyes and
an open heart. You may want to lay aside any
cares and anxieties and burdens that you came in with this
morning, may want to repent of some sin as we get ready to hear
from God. I'll give you a few moments and
then I'll read the text. John chapter 5, starting in
verse 31, Jesus says to these religious leaders, he says if I
alone bear witness about myself, my testimony is not true.
There is another who bears witness about me and I know that
the testimony that He bears about me is true.
You sent John, he's talking about John the Baptist, and he
has borne witness to the truth. Not that the testimony that I
receive is from man, but I say these things so that you may be
saved. He was a burning and shining
lamp, and you were really willing to rejoice for a while
in His light. But the testimony that I have is
greater than that of John. For the works that the Father
has given me to accomplish, the very works that I am doing, bear
witness about me that the Father has sent me.
And the Father who sent me has Himself borne witness about me.
His voice you have never heard, His form you have never seen,
and you do not have His word abiding in you.
For you do not believe the one in whom He has sent You Search
the Scriptures because you think that in them you have eternal
life. And it is they that bear witness
about me. Yet you refuse to come to me
that you may have life. I do not receive glory from
people, but I know that you do not have the love of God within
you. I have come in my Father's name,
and you do not receive Me. If another comes in His own
name, you will receive Him. How Can you believe when you
receive glory from one another and do not seek the glory that
comes from the only God? Do not think that I will accuse
you to the Father. There is one who accuses you,
Moses, on whom you have set your hope.
For if you believe Moses, you would believe me, for he wrote
of me. But if you do not believe his
writings, how will you believe my words?
Complicated text. Today let me pray for us and
then we'll dive in. Jesus, we worship you because
you are one with the Father. You are almighty God, your
Maker, your Creator, your Savior, your Redeemer, your
Lord, and so we're here in your name.
We're here to worship you, not ourselves.
We're here to hear from you, not just to hear from me or
ourselves. And so we pray, Jesus, that you
would speak loud and clear to all of us through your Bible
today. Give us humble, soft hearts and
open ears and open eyes that we might see you and hear you.
God, we give this time to you. Help us to understand, fill us
with your Holy Spirit, make us more like you, and help us to be
more and more in love with you and devoted to you.
And we pray all these things in Jesus name, Amen.
OK, so back up to verse 31. Jesus says to these Jewish
leaders, he says, if I alone bear witness about myself, my
testimony is not true. What is Jesus saying there?
Well, he is arguing his case. And so this whole section of the
book of John, we get like courtroom vibes.
It's kind of like a trial. Jesus is defending himself
against accusations. So he says, if it's only me
testifying to my Godness, then I don't have a case.
Anyone can say anything about themselves, right?
But that does not necessarily make it true.
And if you have little kids and you know your little kids,
Mommy, daddy, I'm a horsey. You're like, no, you're not.
I'm a froggy. You know, you're not.
I'm a dinosaur. You're like, well, you're a
monster. You're not a dinosaur.
But just because you say that, that does not make you that
right? It's not necessarily true.
According to Jewish legal standards, for a valid
testimony, you had to have at least two or three witnesses.
Jesus knows this. This is Deuteronomy 1915.
He says a single witness shall not suffice against a person for
any crime or for any wrongdoing in connection with any offense
that he has committed. Only on the evidence of two
witnesses or of three witnesses shall a charge be established.
So this is ingrained into the Jewish mind.
This is how these people think. Jesus knows that this is how
they think. So he lists four more witnesses
to his divinity. He's like Deuteronomy says, you
need two or three. How about I give you 4?
And now he's going to present to them the four witnesses that
bear witness to the fact that he is in fact God.
And the four witnesses are John the Baptist.
The miracles are works that he does the Father himself and the
scriptures. OK, so we're going to work
through those 4 witnesses. So the first witness, John the
Baptist, look at verse 32. Jesus says there is another who
bears witness about me and I know that the testimony that he
bears about me is true. He's telling the truth about me.
You sent to John and he has borne witness to the truth.
So he says you asked John the Baptist, my cousin, who is in
fact a prophet from God, what he thought about me, and he told
you the truth about who I really AM.
And so Jesus is thinking back to some things that John has said
that the apostle John has recorded that John the Baptist
has said in chapters 1 and chapter 3, John said things
about Jesus like he is the Lamb of God who takes away the sins
of the world. He said even though he was born
after me, he was before me, right?
What does that mean? He's like, he's my little
cousin, but he's actually the eternal God.
He says. John says I saw the Spirit
descend and remain upon him. And So what John is saying is
Jesus is greater than the Old Testament prophets because the
the Spirit descended on him and then remained on him.
In the Old Testament, the Spirit would come upon a man for a
time, for a season, for a task. But with Jesus, the Spirit came
upon him and remained upon him. John says he's the Son of God.
John says he's the groom who has come for his bride, his people.
He's telling them Jesus is the Messiah, Jesus is the
long-awaited Savior King who's come in the light of David to
rescue and redeem his people. That is John's testimony about
Jesus. Look at verse 34.
Jesus says, not that the testimony that I receive is from
man, but I say these things so that you may be saved.
I think what he's saying here is I don't need John's testimony to
prove who I am, but you do, right?
You need it. And so that's why I'm telling
you this. That's why John told you this.
It's so that you might be saved, so that you can actually believe
in what he said. Verse 35, he says he was a
burning and shining lamp and you were willing to rejoice for a
while in his light. So he's saying John did his job,
right? John did his job.
He was a lamp. He wasn't the light.
Who's the light? Jesus is the light of the world.
John is the lamp. He's trying to illuminate who I
really am, who Jesus really is. He is the light that gives life.
And we just look back at John, chapter 1.
This is in John's prologue starting in verse 6, The apostle
John says there was a man sent from God whose name was John.
He's talking about John. Lots of John's we got to deal
with here, right? This is he's, he's John the
Baptist. He came as a witness to bear
witness about the light that all might believe through him.
He, John, was not the light, but came to bear witness about the
light, the true light which gives light to everyone.
Jesus was coming into the world, so he says John did his job.
You were excited about his message.
You were excited about his light for a while until I started
telling you that I'm one with the Father.
And then you did not so excited anymore.
Now you're accusing me of blasphemy and trying to kill me.
John the Baptist, who was an authentic prophet sent from the
one true God, said that Jesus is Messiah, and Jesus is saying
that that should be enough. All right, that should be enough
for you. Now, one quick point of
application here. I love John the Baptist because
he knew who he was and he knew who he wasn't, right?
He is the messenger. He's not the message, He's the
lamp, he's not the light. He knew what he could do and he
knew what he couldn't do. He is the the bearer of the
message. He's not the Savior.
And so John, we see so much humility in John, right?
He says, he says in chapter 3, verse 30, he says he must
increase that I might decrease, right?
He's talking about Jesus. He must increase and I must
decrease. He's a humble, humble man.
He knew his place. I think this is actually very
helpful and very important for us to remember as we are seeking
to share the message of the Gospel with other people.
I used to be so hard on myself that I'm not better at getting
people saved. And if you share any sense of
guilt like that, like you don't have to raise your hand, but I
just, you know, like, why aren't I more?
Why aren't I better? Why aren't I more effective?
And I would, I would kind of lay these guilt trips on myself and
just feel crummy about myself. And then at some point I
realized, wait a second, I can't save anybody.
I can't save anybody. I can give the most perfect,
articulate gospel presentation. And unless the Holy Spirit moves
through that message, through those words, I can't do anything
about it, right? I can't make a dead soul alive.
Only God can do that. I'm not the Savior.
I'm only the messenger. I'm not the light.
I'm just supposed to be a lamp. It's true of all of us.
You're not the light. I'm not the light.
You can't save. I can't save.
Only Jesus can do that. And so our job is just to be a
faithful lamp, right? Just be a faithful lamp, be a
faithful messenger, and God will take that message and He will
provide light. That's what he did through John.
There's power in the Gospel to save, not in you.
OK, Don't forget that. Know who you are, know your
role, stay in your lane. You be the messenger and let God
deliver the message. So witness number one is John
the Baptist witness #2 we move on and we see Jesus talking
about his miracles or his works. Verse 36, he says, but the
testimony that I have is greater than that of John for the works
that the Father has given me to accomplish, the very works that
I am doing bear witness about me that the Father has sent me.
So he's saying I have another testimony for you, another
witness for you that is greater than John the prophet.
And that is my miracles that I have begun doing.
And my miracles prove that God has sent me right there evidence
to you. And he's referring at least to
the two primary miracles we've seen in the text so far, Jesus
changing water into wine at the wedding in Cana in chapter 2.
And then also we saw in chapter 5, Jesus healing a disabled man
who would have been disabled for 38 years.
No one would be able to help him for 38 years.
And then Jesus just heals him. All right?
These are works that only God could do.
No mere man, no mere mortal could accomplish those things.
Water has a very simple molecular structure.
You know what it is, right? H2O.
You sat if you were awake in chemistry class, at least you
learned that, right? H2O.
Wine is more complicated. Wine is about 85% H2O.
And then there's a whole bunch of other stuff mixed in there.
There's ethanol and sugars and proteins and acids and and other
stuff. To transform water into wine.
You have to create molecules, OK?
You have to create something to be there that was not initially
there. Who has power to create
molecules? Does does man have, Has any
human even now in our scientific age figured out how to make
something from nothing? No, they're trying and trying
and trying. But we can make lots of things,
but you have to start with something.
But Jesus here in making the water into wine is doing a
supernatural feat above nature, superior to just nature.
He is creating something when there was nothing there before.
This is John chapter one verse 3.
All things were made through him and without him was not anything
made that was made. That's what God can do.
God spoke a word and creation happened from nothing.
Ex Nilo. And Jesus is saying, he said
when I did that, when I made the water into wine, that wasn't a
trick, that wasn't smoke and mirrors.
That wasn't like a magician pulling a rabbit out of a hat.
You realize when the magician magician pulls a rabbit out of
the hat, the rabbit already existed.
Right. It was just hiding somewhere.
It's sleight of hand. He's tricking you.
It's illusion, saying that's not what I did.
He says I made something out of nothing.
This is a miracle. I am proof to you that I am God,
the Creator. It's the same with the healing
of the disabled man. He's saying that was a miracle.
He was suffering for 38 years, 38 years.
No one could help him laying on a mat by this pool suffering.
And he's saying in a moment I made him whole.
In a moment, with a word, I made him whole.
I healed him. How did I do that?
Well, I made him in his mother's womb.
I knew exactly what was wrong with him in the 1st place.
I actually knew every single cell in his body and I am God.
And so I healed him. I have the power and the
authority to do it. Jesus could not have done these
mighty works if he was not God. And by the way, there's more to
come, a lot more to come. Greater things than these,
right? He says earlier.
Lots more miracles to come. Now, it's very easy for us to
relegate Jesus's power to the book, right?
And think that was a story back then, that happened back then,
but that kind of stuff doesn't happen now.
We're so much more educated, right?
Enlightenment and college degrees and science and AI.
We have all these things and we don't, you know, God doesn't do
that kind of stuff anymore, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah.
But I'm telling you, Jesus is the same yesterday, today, and
forever. If he had power back then to do
these works, He has power today to do these works.
He will always have power to do these works.
He didn't lose His power sometime between the Book of
Revelation and now. Some of you need Jesus's power
in your life. You need a word from Him.
You need a touch from Him. You need healing from Him.
You need deliverance from Him. He is able to help you.
You have to understand that He is able.
He is still able to help you. Some of you have been fighting
your anxieties, your depression, your fears, your torment, your
enslaved in certain areas that you cannot seem to break out of.
You've tried therapy, you've tried books, you've tried
memorizing verses, and it's like you're just stuck.
Come to Jesus, come to Jesus. He is alive, He is with us, and
He is able to help you. Some of you are in a hard spot
as far as provision goes, right? You do your best to work hard
and earn money and budget and spend responsibly, but it's like
you still, you just can't. It's like you just don't have
enough. Or maybe some of you have crisis
expenses. Don't you hate crisis expenses?
It's like, I was doing such a good job.
We were finally stable financially and then bam, I need
a new roof. You know, like refrigerator
breaks out of nowhere and you're just freaking out about that.
Please understand Jesus is Maker and Creator, Jesus's provider.
Come to him, Seek him, ask Him, he.
He can help you. Some of you need healing.
You need healing in your physical bodies.
You have medical conditions. Some of you don't know what's
going on. The doctors don't know what's
going on. But you're off and you know
you're off. You have pain.
Jesus can help you. He is the great physician of our
souls, yes, but also of our bodies.
Let me share a story with you. This is a this is hot off the
press. I love this.
It's about a young man in our church named Isaiah.
He, he gave me permission to share this story with you all.
And I'm just going to read his words.
He said leading up to Sunday a few weeks ago, I had been
dealing with excruciating knee pain for about two weeks.
I'm an athlete and a coach, so I usually know how to manage pain
or rehab an injury. But this time was different.
I couldn't walk for long distances, stretch my leg out or
be on my feet for long. It felt deeper than just a
strain or overuse. I wasn't planning to go up for
prayer that Sunday, but during the message, Tony invited anyone
who needed physical healing to come forward.
That's when I knew I needed to respond.
When I went up, a couple men prayed for me.
As they did, I felt heat in my knee, not just surface level,
but like it was being rebuilt from the inside out.
We all knew God was doing something in that moment.
The next day I lifted heavy with 0 pain and now I'm back training
to run and hoop again. I've been able to stretch long,
walk long distances, and do things I couldn't do just a few
days earlier with no pain. I know Jesus healed me, not just
for me, but to remind us all that he sees us and that he is
our healer. I had lunch with Isaiah on
Thursday. Every time I see Mike.
How's your knee? How's your knee?
Like I'm kind, I'm, I'm a, I'm a
skeptic when it comes to healing.
I don't want to claim that something is a healing if it's
not actually a healing. And so he keeps telling me it
feels great. It feels great.
I'm like, praise God, he has
power to heal. He still heals broken bodies.
We're so quick to run to ibuprofen and you should I use
ibuprofen. It's fine.
God's grace to humanity. But what about prayer, right?
What about coming to God and asking God who is the maker and
creator of your body? Jesus, who is the great
physician, the great healer to show you mercy and heal.
We pray. Sometimes he does it.
When he does it, it's like throw my hands up.
I don't know why he didn't that time, but what I know is
sometimes he does. And so we keep coming to asking
him to heal. He is able to heal.
So Jesus has appealed so far to two witnesses, to John the
Baptist, and now to his works. But he says, I'm not done yet.
And he goes on. We see the third witness, the
witness of the Father himself. Look at verse 37.
He says, And the Father who sent me has himself borne witness
about me. His voice you have never heard,
His form you have never seen, and you do not have his word
abiding in you, for you do not believe the one whom he has
sent. Yikes.
So he says the Father himself has told you the truth about me.
I think he's referring to the moment when he was baptized by
John the Baptist, his cousin, and the heavens open.
And his Father spoke audibly, like able to hear with your ears
of flesh. Listen to this account in Mark
chapter 1. Verses 9 through 11 will be up
on the screen. It says in those days Jesus came
from Nazareth of Galilee and was baptized by John and the Jordan.
And when he came up out of the water, immediately he saw the
heavens being torn open and the Spirit descending on him like a
dove, and a voice came from heaven.
You are my beloved Son. With you I am well pleased.
In this moment, the Father himself is speaking audibly and
calling Jesus his Son. He's saying I'm pleased with
him. He authenticates him.
He's saying he's not a fraud, He's not a lunatic, he's not a
madman, He's not a poser. He is my son, the one whom I
sent. He and I are one.
Jesus is saying to them, he says God has spoken through my
miracles, but you can't hear him.
You can't see him in me, right? His voice you've never heard,
his form you've never seen. He's spoken through the prophets
in his word, but even though you know your Old Testament inside
and out, you still don't believe, right?
He's spoken audibly, but you won't listen.
You've heard him, but you won't listen.
It is possible to hear about Jesus, but not actually here.
And that's what's going on in these Jewish leaders.
Jesus keeps presenting them with evidence and evidence and
evidence and word and word, and they just can't hear.
They had many voices, they had many signs, but they were still
deaf and they were still blind. And now, before we get too hard
on them, please realize this isn't just their problem.
This is a human problem, all right?
This is a human problem. As humans, we are born into sin.
We are dead in our sin and in our trespasses.
And guess what? Dead people can't see and dead
people can't hear, right? It doesn't.
It doesn't work. We all need God to revive our
hearts, to open our spiritual eyes, to open our spiritual ears
so that we can hear, so that the message of the gospel that Jesus
is God, that we are God is holy and we are sinners and deserving
of judgment. And God sent Jesus to die in a
cross for our sin, and then he rose again to authenticate who
he was. We need God to give us eyes and
ears to be able to hear, to be able to receive so that we can
respond with faith. We're in the same boat as these
Jewish leaders. We've just on this side of
Jesus, we've experienced the grace of God that he made us
alive. My senior year in college, I
was, I was not a follower of Jesus.
I, I grew up going to a formal denominational church, but I did
not have ears to hear. I did not have eyes to see who
Jesus was. I had people through my
childhood sharing the gospel with me, but I was blind and
deaf to the truth of the message.
My senior year in college, God began stirring in me and it was
a whole bunch of things going on in my life at that point.
I think it was like 1/4 life crisis.
OK, I've not had a midlife crisis, thank God, but I think I
had a quarter life crisis. And, and I remember during that
season, because I had some background with God and
Christianity in the Bible, I remember getting down on my
knees next to my bed in my apartment one night.
And I remember specifically asking God to bring someone into
my life who could help me understand the Bible and help me
understand who He was because I knew that meant something.
I knew I needed something there. That was the best prayer I have
ever prayed in my life. And it did not take God long to
answer it. Shortly after that, I met
someone who is a Christian. I was invited to an Inter
varsity Christian Fellows fellowship, small group, just
the campus ministry and the college campus that I was a part
of. I started going to these Bible
study groups with other college students and hearing more about
Jesus and asking questions and they would answer questions.
I started going to church with them, going to their large group
meetings together. And I remember very distinctly
the moment I was driving through campus one night.
I was heading to the library to study and I remember thinking, I
believe this stuff about Jesus. And for me it was like, where
did that come from? How did that happen?
You know, it's like all of a sudden I felt like I could see
him for who he was. I could see myself for who I
was, a Sinner in need of grace, and I believed, right?
God just sovereignly, supernaturally opened my eyes,
opened my ears and made me new again, made me alive again.
Now, I know that for some of you, God is stirring in you.
You know God is stirring in you, and I suspect maybe for some of
you, he's been stirring in you for a long time.
It's like you feel this kind of dissatisfaction with life,
reality, you know, you name it. It's like something is not
whole, something is not right, something is not complete.
And maybe you've searched down this path to see if you can find
life or you've searched down that path and maybe if I try
this, I'll get there. Maybe.
And it's like every one of them just feels like a dead end to
you. I believe God is stirring in you
and He's calling you. And so I would encourage you to
ask Him. Remember, He's the Savior.
Ask Him to give you eyes to see Him.
Ask Him to give you ears to hear Him.
Ask Him to give you a soft heart that you might receive Him.
He loves to answer those kinds of prayers.
Turn to Him, seek Him, and I would encourage you as He draws
you to Himself. Trust in Him and believe in Him.
That is how a person is saved and made right with God.
Many of you here, probably most of you here are followers of
Jesus, but you have loved ones who don't believe, family,
friends, Co workers, roommates, children.
Please understand that evangelism, again, remember,
we're the, we're the messenger. We're not the message, right?
God is the one who takes the message of the gospel and
applies it to a person's heart. And so evangelism must be
coupled with prayer, OK? Because saving is not something
that we can do. Saving is something that only
God can do. God through prayer breaks up
Stony, the soil in Stony hearts, right?
He breaks that up. It's like he plows that hardened
earth over and over so that when the seeds of the gospel are
planted, they can actually begin to germinate and take root and
grow into saving faith. So I just want to encourage you.
Sometimes it's discouraging because it's like they just
don't, they're not listening. They don't see it the way that I
see it. And I've tried and, and I want
to encourage you to keep praying and keep sharing and trust and
watch God move and act. I was reading a story about a
man named Hudson Taylor, today, famous missionary from at the
1800s, first guy to kind of move missions into inland China.
And it's a story. And he was known for prayer and
for faith. I mean, that was his thing.
He would just trust God for crazy works and God would
deliver. And I was reading a story about
how he had two people who he loved who were not followers of
Jesus. He prayed for them for 50 years.
For 50 years, he prayed for them.
One of them became a follower of Jesus right before Hudson Taylor
died. The other one became a Christian
right after he died. So he got to enjoy the fruit of
one of those 50 years of prayer. The other one he's enjoying now
in heaven. But be faithful.
God is the one that opens ears and opens eyes.
Jesus calls on the Father as a witness.
And now we look at the 4th witness, the witness of the
scriptures. Look at verse 39.
This is where it starts getting a little hairy, confusing in the
text. What in the world is Jesus
talking about? So he says in verse 39, he says,
you search the Scriptures. These are these are men who have
given their life to reading and studying and copying the
Scriptures. They knew all of it.
Many of them knew it by heart. You search the Scriptures
because you think that in them you have eternal life, and it is
they that bear witness about me, yet you refuse to come to me
that you may have life. So he's saying you know your Old
Testament inside and out. You have chunks of it memorized,
but you've completely missed the point.
You thought that knowing the book is what gave you life.
There's actually a revered Jewish rabbi who has, who said,
he said, Whoso hath gained the words of the Torah hath gained
for himself life in the world to come.
So if you've gained the words of the Torah, if you've if you've
read them and heard them, that equals life.
So this is their kind of operating system.
As long as I know these words, then I have life.
But Jesus is correcting them here.
He's saying knowing the Bible is not what gives you life.
Knowing the one who the Bible points to is what gives you
life. The life is not in the words on
the page. The life is in the author of the
words on the page. This is very important.
We live in a very hyper intellectual Information Society
and we tend to think that if I can just know more, that leads
to life. And you cannot apply that kind
of thinking to your Christianity.
The truth is, the whole Bible is a kind of a signpost, a pointer.
It testifies or it bears witness about Jesus, who is the author
of the Scriptures, and it is a call to come to him right now.
Don't just stay on the page, come to Jesus himself.
Let me just do a quick, maybe a big sweeping summary of this
idea. Show you how Jesus is the point
of the Bible in Genesis chapter 1.
Jesus is the Word who was with God and was God in the
beginning. OK, John echoes that in his
beginning of the book of John, Genesis chapter 3.
Right? Adam and Eve eat the fruit.
Jesus is the seed of the woman who will crush the serpent's
head. Where does he do that?
On the cross in Genesis 12, Jesus is the offspring of Adam
through whom all the families of the earth would be blessed.
In the book of Exodus, Jesus is the new Moses who will lead
God's people out of slavery, through the wilderness and into
the promised land. Jesus is the fulfillment of that
type, that picture that Moses was.
In Leviticus, Jesus is the sacrificial lamb who would atone
for the sins of God's people. In the book of Numbers, Jesus is
the bronze serpent that is lifted up to save Israel from
death because of their sin. In the book of Deuteronomy,
which actually means second law, Jesus is the only one who
perfectly obeyed and fulfilled the law.
He's the only one who could. Jesus is the great high priest
who mediates between God and man.
Jesus is the ultimate prophet who not only spoke the word of
God, but he is himself the word of God.
Jesus is the perfect King of whom the great King David was
only a shadow. David failed.
Jesus is our King, will never ever fail us.
He will rule us perfectly. Jesus is the wisdom of God that
is taught in the Proverbs. Jesus is the one being
worshipped and prayed to in the Psalms.
Jesus is the coming Messiah that all of the prophets foretold.
Jesus is the new Adam. The first Adam messed up.
The the new Adam came to make right what the first one messed
up. Jesus is the ark that saves
God's people from judgment. Jesus is the Passover lamb who
was slain for our sins. Jesus is the manna from heaven
that feeds God's people. He is the water from the rock
that satisfies our thirst. He is the Tabernacle and the
temple where a man goes to meet with God.
He is the eternal Sabbath where we find ultimate and true rest.
Jesus fulfills the Scriptures. The Bible is about Jesus.
The whole book is in some way or another foreshadowing him,
pointing to Him, calling us to know Him, to put our trust in
Him, to love Him, to worship him.
Now when you start to see these things in the Bible, your Bible
reading life will come to life. It just starts exploding off the
page and you read a story from Zechariah.
What's in Zechariah Lamentations.
That sounds so depressing. You know, Ezekiel, what a weird
dude. Like what in the world?
But when you actually begin to develop eyes, you start to see
Jesus everywhere he is. He's the substance.
He's he's the he's the the star of the show.
The Bible's about him when God gives you eyes to see this
stuff. Now Bible reading isn't just
like assigned homework. You guys like assigned homework
reading. No, it becomes joy.
It becomes delight. It's like it becomes like a life
giving meeting with a friend where you come face to face with
Jesus. You connect with the author of
scripture. So I want to give some just some
practical thoughts for you here about Bible reading.
Don't read your Bible like a textbook looking for information
if that's the way you approach it.
It's going to feel like homework.
It's going to be very dry. Read the Bible to see and
connect with Jesus. OK, Read the Bible to see Jesus
and to connect with Jesus. And so let me give you a very
simple, basic framework for your Bible reading life.
And you might want to write this down if you're a note taker
type. Very, very simple.
Read to connect to to Jesus with prayer as worship.
OK, read to connect with Jesus with prayer and as worship.
When you sit down with your Bible in the morning, over
lunch, in the evening, whenever you read your Bible, remind
yourself that when you open this book you have a chance to come
face to face with the Creator, that you have a chance to
connect with God himself. Moses had to climb up Mount
Sinai to see God, to talk with God.
You and I can sit in a recliner and open a book read to connect
with him with prayer. Very important that you read
your Bibles with prayer. Understand the Bible is a
supernatural book written by a supernatural God, about a
supernatural God, right? The book is about him.
It's not about us. It's about heavenly things.
Prayer calls upon that God to help us, to help us see, to help
us here, to help us understand, to help us receive, to help us
digest, to help us implement. So read your Bible with prayer.
Pray before you read. Maybe you take a minute and you
pray before you read and pray something like God, I'm sitting
down right now. I want to meet with you.
I want to see you. I want to hear you.
Open my eyes, open my ears, soften my heart that I might
receive from you right now as I read your Bible.
Simple prayer, asking Him to help while you read.
Pray, right? Thank Him for the things that
you read that strike you. Ask Him to help you with the
things that you read that are challenging to you.
I'm regularly as I'm reading my Bible on my own, I whisper out
prayers under my breath and I'm just seeking God in the midst of
my Bible reading. Pray after you read, Thank Him,
right? Take hold of the promises that
He has made to you in Scripture. Bring your petitions, your
requests to him. Give praise to Him.
Worship Him for what He's just shown you.
Read your Bibles with prayer. And then finally, read your
Bibles as worship, right? Not duty, but delight.
Not you have to. But you get to.
Why? Because you love and you adore
and you worship the one who the book is revealing to you.
Bible reading to connect with the one who your heart adores is
worship, right? When we think of worship, we
usually think of singing. But you realize reading your
Bible to connect with Jesus is an act of worship in itself.
The Bible is about Jesus and it's meant to lead us to Him.
So now let's dive very quickly into verses 41 through 47.
This is the most challenging part of this text, and so I'm
going to read bits of it and I'm going to give you the TRV
translation, the Tony Renvestal Version translation of these
verses. He says he goes on in this last
chunk of text and basically to tell them, you know your Bibles,
but you've missed the point entirely.
He says in verse 41, he says I do not receive glory from
people. And I think what he's saying to
them is I'm not here to get your approval.
I'm not here to people, please. Obviously I'm telling you off
right now. You know verse 42, he says, but
I know that you do not have the love of God within you.
I have come in my Father's name and you do not receive me.
If another comes in his own name, you will receive him.
He's saying something like, you know your Bibles, but you don't
really love God because you've rejected me and I'm God.
If somebody else came promoting themselves Tooting their horn as
an important person, you would believe them, you would receive
them. Verse 44, he says how Can you
believe when you receive glory from one another and do not seek
the glory that comes from the only God?
He's saying it's no wonder that you don't believe.
All you care about is impressing one another with your vast
knowledge. You don't care about God's
glory. You care about your own glare,
your own glory. You don't worship God, you're
worshiping yourselves. And then 45 to the end he says,
do not think that I will accuse you to the Father.
There is one who accuses you, Moses, on whom you have set your
hope. For if you believed Moses, you
would believe me, for he wrote of me.
But if you do not believe his writing, how will you believe my
words? He's saying I'm not here to
accuse you because somebody else already has.
And it's Moses. You worship his words, but you
missed the point of his words completely.
He's writing about me. If he was here right now, he
would say you have not understood a word of what I was
writing. This book is about Jesus.
If you don't believe that, it's no wonder you don't believe in
Jesus. So he is.
He's really bashing their so-called faith which is
completely misplaced. It was in their knowledge, not
the savior that the Bible speaks of and points to.
This is a this is a warning for the religious.
This is a warning for the hyper intellectuals among us.
You can dominate in a Bible bowl.
You can be the Bible trivia wizard.
You can go on Jeopardy and oh look, a Bible category and you
can clear out that category because you know the facts, you
know it all, but not have eternal life in Christ.
You're not saved by how much of the Bible you know, you're not
saved by having consistent quiet time.
You're not saved by how many verses you've memorized.
You're not saved by your weekly church attendance.
Those things are helpful habits. And I don't want to, you know,
you should pursue those things. You should do all those things,
but ultimately those things are not what save you from sin.
We are saved by grace alone through faith alone in Jesus
Christ alone. You might think of it this way.
This is a little bit of a crude illustration, but it's I think
it's helpful. The Bible is the menu that leads
you to the meal. OK.
The Bible is the menu that leads you to the meal.
The meal is what gives you life, right?
If if I walked into Applebee's and you're chewing on the menu
like you don't, you don't understand how this works.
There's no there's like that is showing you what they will bring
you then that you can feast on and enjoy and it will give you
nourishment in life, right. So, and I don't want I'm not
trying to diminish the Bible because this is a holy book that
points to our Savior, but the life is in our Savior.
And so we read the book knowing that it's going to show us him
and point us to him. If you have a lot of head
knowledge about the Bible, but not a lot of love for Jesus in
your heart, then I would urge you to examine your faith.
Examine your faith because it might be that you're worshipping
the words and not the author of the words.
And that's a problem. So as I close us here, John the
Baptist, Jesus's miracles, the Father, and the Scriptures all
testify to the fact that Jesus is Lord.
If you don't yet believe that, I pray that you will consider that
I would ask you to read your Bible, look for Jesus in the
scriptures, pray that God would open your eyes and open your
ears and show himself to you through His Bible.
And then repent of your sin, turn away from it, and put your
trust in Jesus, the only one who can save.
Those of you who are in a stale Bible reading rut, I would, if I
were you, I would ask Jesus to open your eyes.
I would learn how to pray through that.
Repent of your unbelief, repent of having lukewarm hearts, and
seek Him afresh. Look for him on all the pages.
I would urge you to read, to learn, to study, to memorize, to
feast on the Scriptures, but make sure that in the end,
you're getting to the author of the Scriptures.
And then finally, all of us, I want us just to remember this.
Jesus is absolutely trustworthy. He is absolutely trustworthy.
You can take him at His word. He has proven through witnesses
that he is who He says He is, and He will do what he says he
will do Trust him. Let's all stand.
We're going to worship Jesus now together.
We could have the band come on the stage.
I want to pray for us. Worship is a response to God as
we've just heard from Him through His Bible.
Now we get a chance and the opportunity to privilege to turn
our faces to Him, open our hearts to Him, lift our hands to
Him, raise our voices to Him, and praise Him and worship Him
and thank Him for who He is and what He has done.
So I encourage you to sing, and I encourage you to sing loud
together, right? And God loves a joyful noise.
And so I'm going to pray for us. And then we'll worship with the
band. And then we'll have a time at
the very end of our service where if you would like to come
forward and have someone pray for you individually, you can do
so. But first, let's worship him.
Father, I thank you for your gathered church.
I thank you for your Bible, the gift that it is to us.
Thank you that you are speaking God who has revealed himself to
us in many ways over many, many years.
I thank you for the gift that the Scriptures are to us and
help us just to remember who they point to.
Help us to be worshippers, not of the book, but of the God that
the book is about. And so even now, as we sing to
you, Lord, would you give us freedom and joy as we celebrate
you, as we worship and praise you.
You are good, you are holy, you are worthy.
And so we lift our voices and we give ourselves to you.
Now we pray that you would be honored and glorified and
pleased with our worship. And we pray all these things
through Jesus. Amen.