Category Archives: John

Wednesday with John – Some Thing More

Posted on March 23, 2022 | Leave a comment

John 5:1 After this there was a feast of the Jews, and Jesus went up to Jerusalem. 2 Now there is in Jerusalem by the Sheep Gate a pool, in Aramaic called Bethesda, which has five roofed colonnades. 3 In these lay a multitude of invalids—blind, lame, and paralyzed. 5 One man was there who had been an invalid for thirty-eight years. 6 When Jesus saw him lying there and knew that he had already been there a long time, he said to him, “Do you want to be healed?” 7 The sick man answered him, “Sir, I have no one to put me into the pool when the water is stirred up, and while I am going another steps down before me.” 8 Jesus said to him, “Get up, take up your bed, and walk.” 9 And at once the man was healed, and he took up his bed and walked. ESV 

What is the general theme of the passage?
The name Bethesda means either house of mercy or house of grace but it seems improbable that pool has any religious connection to the God of the Jews OR that the people there, were waiting for Israel’s God to heal them, especially on this Sabbath day.  Some versions have added to the ending of verse 3 and all of verse 4.  In many versions this addition is only a footnote a because the ancient manuscripts do not make that connection.  This pool would likely have always been a place of uncleanness to the Jews because “a multitude of invalids—blind, lame, and paralyzed were there.” The mystery of this water is healing happens only when the water is “stirred up.”  

What does it say about God (or Jesus or the Holy Spirit?)
Jesus chooses to go to this pool to find this man. It seems so similar to what He chose to do when he offered “living” water to the outcast woman at the well.  Jesus’s assurance is “My Father is working until now, and I am working” even on the Sabbath.

What does it say about people?
Here are some questions to read and ponder: Why did the crippled man not just say “yes” when Jesus asked him “Do you want to be healed?”  If he IS a Jew, what’s he doing there on the Sabbath?  If he’s NOT a Jew, why did he go to the Temple after his healing?  This invalid man may be yet another story of someone who is not necessarily Godless, but not Godly either.  He knows some of the essentials: the water in this pool is identified with the grace and mercy of some mysterious power.  He knows there is some miraculous healing possible. He knows he needs some thing more, some one who can get him to that “stirred up” water.

Is there truth here for me?
How many times has this man been taken to this same pool and been disappointed?  Jesus is not just the some one who will put that invalid into the pool to be healed.  HE IS the “stirred up” water”  that man cannot reach on his own.  Jesus has given that invalid man the one  thing that pool could never offer, a healing that is something more — a connection to Him.  Jesus is the missing verse 4! 

a “waiting for a certain movement of the water, for an angel of the Lord came from time to time and stirred up the water. And the first person to step in after the water was stirred was healed of whatever disease he had.”

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Wednesday with John – Advantage Takers

Posted on March 16, 2022 | Leave a comment

32 DAYS TO EASTER!

John 4:43 After the two days [in Samaria]  he [Jesus] departed for Galilee. 44 (For Jesus himself had testified that a prophet has no honor in his own hometown.) 45 So when he came to Galilee, the Galileans welcomed him, having seen all that he had done in Jerusalem at the feast. For they too had gone to the feast. ESV

What is the general theme of the passage?
Jesus has narrowed the scope of his influence by moving from the big city of Jerusalem, through the in-between place of Samaria, to zero in on His home territory.  Jesus isn’t fooled into assuming the basis of the welcome in Galilee is prompted by anything more than the “actions speak louder than words” stories of His time in Jerusalem.  Those miracle-working realities are meant to be actions that emphasize the Words of truth behind them.  His recent time in Samaria shows us the stark contrast of the “Samaritans welcoming Jesus because of His Words and the people of Galilee focused on the signs and wonders.”a

What does it say about God (or Jesus or the Holy Spirit?) Jesus has come to His home for one prophetic purpose: to help those who could not see past the power His actions to hear and recognize the truth of His Words. 

What does it say about people?
People are advantage-takers and Jesus has come home for the express purpose to give the people in His home territory the opportunity to take advantage of Him.

Is there truth here for me?
I wrote that line above about Jesus giving the opportunity to take advantage of Him as a play on words before it actually dawned on me how true those words were. Jesus is just 32 days from this year’s reminder that He has overcome a desperately broken and negative sin of humanity – to be users of each other and God.  Easter is the action He took to speak the reality of His Words and His Spirit into my past, my present and my future so that I might recognize His purpose for me is to take full advantage of Him and never be satisfied with anything less.

a https://www.desiringgod.org/messages/go-your-son-will-live

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Wednesday with John – In Between

Posted on March 9, 2022 | Leave a comment

John 4:39 Many Samaritans from that city believed in him because of the woman’s  testimony, “He told me all that I ever did.” 40 So when the Samaritans came to him, they asked him to stay with them; and he stayed there two days. 41 And many more believed because of his word. 42 They said to the woman, “It is no longer because of your words that we believe, for we have heard for ourselves, and we know that this is indeed the Savior of the world.” RSV

What is the general theme of the passage?
I suppose because I’m studying both John and Exodus at the same time, this familiar story seems like another story about an exodus to me – the road out of a wilderness on the journey home. Jesus has chosen this direct route that connected the wilderness with the tainted land of Samaria on his way home to Galilee.  Somehow that seems important.  Jesus’s own baptism and the place of God’s proclamation of His Sonship took place in that Judean wilderness.  That is also the place Satan hoped, and failed, to disgrace both Jesus and God with desperate temptations about food, faith and power.  Jesus survived that wilderness and now He’s become the saving link for Samaria, the “in-between” place, filled with people who’ve lost their right to even claim the title “Jew” and He can offer them a greater Home. 

What does it say about God (or Jesus or the Spirit?)
Jesus was able to combine their remembered facts with experience and truth in a way that reached into the history of their heart to turn their facts into faith that He was their way out of that “in-between” place. 

What does it say about people?
The practical truth about Jesus is that He is God and capable of saving people caught “in between” their wilderness and their true Home.  The woman at the well knows old “facts” but is less interested in instructions about eternity than she is in not having to haul water every day.  She acknowledges “our father Jacob, who gave us the well” and “our fathers worshiped on this mountain.”  She obviously has knowledge that affects her mind without her having a conscious awareness her facts are the “kindling” of faith. One new fact has ignited something of faith for her,  “He told me all that I ever did.”

Is there truth here for me? I thought about my own moment of recognizing Jesus, and all the “facts” I’d had for a long time before that day came.  Doubt was not my wilderness, I believed those facts!  But someone else’s facts are only the “in-between” part of faith.  It’s when Jesus enters the “in-between” and turns facts into kindling that ignites faith that you recognize you’ve survived the wilderness and have a Home to aim for.

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Wednesday with John + The Locus

Posted on March 2, 2022 | Leave a comment

John 3:22-30 NIV

Jesus and his disciples
spent some time
and baptized.
John also was baptizing
This was before John was put in prison
An argument developed
over the matter of ceremonial washing.
They came to John and said
the one you testified about
is baptizing,everyone is going to him.
John replied, “A person can receive only
what is given them from heaven.
I am not the Messiah
The friend who attends the bridegroom waits and listens for him,
That joy is mine,
He must become greater; I must become less.

• What is the general theme of the passage?
This is the same desert place where Jesus’s triumphed over His own temptations. That fact, and this place has now become the meaningful locus of the ministry of these two cousins that begins to merge their parallel tracks into the Cross of Christ.  There is some competitive controversy brewing between John’s disciples and a certain Jew[?].  Was baptism a process for purification by the symbolic removal of things determined by a set of rules that made you unclean OR was it an action of repentance with sincere regret and remorse for the unclean things only the heart knew?  John clearly settles the controversy with his own recognition of the greatness of Christ and His joy that he’s been given his role as the friend who attends the bridegroom.

• What does it say about God (or Jesus or the Spirit?) It’s year one of both Jesus’s and John’s ministry.  Jesus has been baptized by John who identified Him as the one sent from God.  Jesus has been through the preparation of His own temptations. Peter, Andrew, Philip and Nathanael have been called, the water has been turned into wine, the temple has been cleared and Jesus has begun his ministry of transforming faith from a corporate expression of worship to a personal one with a nighttime conversation with Nicodemus. 

• What does it say about people?
Human nature is competitive and competition can breed controversy.  The desire to control circumstances of obedience and observance happens because of the parallel tracks of faith and personal behavior. 

• Is there truth here for me?
Reading about Judea being the place Jesus returned after His own temptations made me think about my own baptism.  I was about 12, but it was a meaningless process until I met Jesus twenty-one years later. That was my own time in the desert of temptations that made me realize life is like parallel tracks for many of us who know there IS a God but that’s about it!  I knew enough to want to try to keep those two tracks somewhat parallel but still didn’t recognize that was my desert until the action of a repentant heart revealed there was more to life than  being “not Godless, but not Godly either.” That’s when my two parallel lines began to merge into the locus that looks more and more like a Cross to me.

 

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Wednesday with John – Conversation

Posted on February 23, 2022 | Leave a comment

John 3:1 Now there was a man of the Pharisees, named Nicodemus, a ruler of the Jews. 2 This man came to Jesus by night and said to him, “Rabbi, we know that you are a teacher come from God; for no one can do these signs that you do, unless God is with him.” 3 Jesus answered him, “Truly, truly, I say to you, unless one is born anew, he cannot see the kingdom of God.” 4 Nicodemus said to him, “How can a man be born when he is old? …7 Do not marvel that I said to you, ‘You must be born anew.’ 8 The wind blows where it wills, and you hear the sound of it, but you do not know whence it comes or whither it goes; so it is with every one who is born of the Spirit.” …16 For God so loved the world that he gave his only Son, that whoever believes in him should not perish but have eternal life.

What is the general theme of the passage?
It’s like Nicodemus and Jesus are having a conversation about two different things.  Nicodemus wants Jesus to know he knows the corporate “we” position: “we” recognize your position with God because of the signs you do.  It’s an odd conversation because Jesus responds to Nicodemus as if he’s answering a question about the Kingdom of God rather than replying to a statement about faith.  Jesus has answered that unasked question to help Nicodemus figure out his “personal” position with God, even if it means going back to square one and learning about love, faith and relationship with God, as if you’re a new born baby.

What does it say about God (or Jesus or the Holy Spirit?
Jesus answers questions of faith our hearts don’t know enough to ask. Jesus has Kingdom answers for our unasked questions that will remind us that new birth is the reality of  our faith and our continued growth.  

What does it say about people?
We’re confused about our faith and what to expect from it.  Our hearts and minds fool us into depending on what “we” know as the basis of our faith rather than our personal relationship with Jesus.

Is there truth here for me?
Keeping the conversation with Jesus going will answer the Kingdom questions I don’t know enough to ask…yet!  I have physical senses that let me feel and hear the wind and I have Spiritual senses [born of the Spirit] so I can understand the difference between a comfortable breeze and a brewing storm in life and in faith — “so it is with every one who is born of the Spirit.”  

Check out this resource on John 3:16.  I feel safe in guaranteeing you will never “breeze” through that verse casually again after investing your time in John Piper’s four labs on John 3:16

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Wednesday with John – The Revelation

Posted on February 16, 2022 | Leave a comment

John 2:13 The Passover of the Jews was at hand, and Jesus went up to Jerusalem. 14 In the temple he found those who were selling oxen and sheep and pigeons, and the money-changers at their business. 15 And making a whip of cords, he drove them all, with the sheep and oxen, out of the temple; and he poured out the coins of the money-changers and overturned their tables. 16 And he told those who sold the pigeons, “Take these things away; you shall not make my Father’s house a house of trade.” 17 His disciples remembered that it was written, “Zeal for thy house will consume me.” 18 The Jews then said to him, “What sign have you to show us for doing this?” 19 Jesus answered them, “Destroy this temple, and in three days I will raise it up.” 20 The Jews then said, “It has taken forty-six years to build this temple, and will you raise it up in three days?” 21 But he spoke of the temple of his body. 22 When therefore he was raised from the dead, his disciples remembered that he had said this; and they believed the scripture and the word which Jesus had spoken.  23 Now when he was in Jerusalem at the Passover feast, many believed in his name when they saw the signs which he did; 24 but Jesus did not trust himself to them, 25 because he knew all men and needed no one to bear witness of man; for he himself knew what was in man. RSV

What is the general theme of the passage?
Jesus confronts the “legal” preparations, obligations and rationalizations for the Passover market that has made the Temple a place of diversion instead of a place to prepare yourself for true Worship.  The focus of worship must be changed from a place to a person.  “And I saw no temple in the city, for its temple is the Lord God the Almighty and the Lamb.” Revelation 21:22 ESV

What does it say about God (or Jesus or the Holy Spirit?)
Jesus, “the Lamb,”  is fully man so he knows how easily our minds, heart and souls can be diverted.  Jesus is “the Almighty” too, so His heart is determined we must NOT get away with allowing even the legal props of faith to divert us from true Worship.

What does it say about people?
People love ritual!  And preparation really is essential to worship.  The first Sign of Jesus was the wine…and the disciples believed.  This Sign of Jesus’s anger is going to be the memory prompt of their belief in what they have learned and remembered about the truth of walking, and working with Jesus.  

Is there truth here for me?
These words of John reveal how different my experience with Jesus is to that show-stopping action of His anger in the Temple.  But life with “the Lord God Almighty AND the Lamb”  is the challenge Jesus and John have made me aware of today.  It’s made me consider two unique truths: Jesus, the Lamb, is determined to love me AND Jesus, the Lord God the Almighty, sometimes has to whip up my conscience with guilt to remind me I don’t want to make His “Father’s house a house of trade.”

Do you not know that you are God’s temple
and that God’s Spirit dwells in you?
I Corinthians 3:16

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Wednesday with John – The Celebration

Posted on February 9, 2022 | Leave a comment

John 2:1-12 The Wedding at Cana
1 On the third day THERE WAS A MARRIAGE at Cana in Galilee, and the mother of Jesus was there;
2 JESUS also was invited to the marriage, WITH HIS DISCIPLES.
3 When THE WINE GAVE OUT, the mother of Jesus said to him, “They have no wine.”
4 And JESUS SAID to her, “O woman, what have you to do with me? MY HOUR HAS NOT YET COME.”
5 His mother said to THE SERVANTS,  “Do whatever he tells you.”
6 Now six stone jars were standing there, for the Jewish rites of purification, each holding twenty or thirty gallons.
7 Jesus said to them, “FILL THE JARS WITH WATER.” And they filled them to the brim.
8 He said to them, “Now draw some out, and take it to THE STEWARD of the feast.” So they took it.
9 When the steward of the feast tasted the water now become wine, and DID NOT KNOW where it came from (though THE SERVANTS who had drawn the water KNEW), the steward of the feast called the bridegroom
10 and said to him, “Every man serves the good wine first; and when men have drunk freely, then the poor wine; but YOU HAVE KEPT THE GOOD WINE UNTIL NOW.”
11 This, the first of HIS SIGNS, Jesus did at Cana in Galilee, and MANIFESTED HIS GLORY; and HIS DISCIPLES BELIEVED in him.
12 After this HE WENT down to Caper′na-um, WITH HIS MOTHER AND HIS BROTHERS AND HIS DISCIPLES; and there they stayed for a few days.

 

What is the general theme of the passage?
The wedding is an allegory of faith.  Jesus does this first sign to give us a picture of the difference between attending a ceremony as a guest and becoming a participant in a lifelong “feast of the best of meats and the finest of wines.” [Isaiah 25:6 NLT]

What does it say about God (or Jesus or the Holy Spirit?)
Jesus’s purpose is to move His people from a ritual to relationship; to celebrate the perfect wedding and lasting relationship of the Groom and His bride.

What does it say about people?
People cannot always meet their own needs. Mary wants to organize Jesus, Jesus is reluctant, the guests are oblivious, the steward is confused, the servants were an unwitting part of the sign that convinced the disciples of their belief.  The wine was the Sign proving He could overcome all those human obstacles to rituals and relationships.

Is there truth here for me?
I am all the things I wrote about “those” people but nothing can limit  glory being manifested better, than when Jesus turns the basic elements of a ceremony into a celebration. I was happy to be a guest at the ceremony for a long time before I realized I have been identified  as the “bride” and that God’s rejoicing. Me too!

For just as a young man marries a maiden,
so your sons will marry you;
and just as a bridegroom rejoices over his bride,
so your God will rejoice over you.
Isaiah 62:5 ISV

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Wednesday with John – Us and Them

Posted on February 2, 2022 | Leave a comment

John 1:35 The next day
John was standing with two of his disciples
36 and said “Behold, the Lamb of God!”
37 The two disciples
followed Jesus
38 Jesus turned and saw them following
“What do you seek?”
They said
“Rabbi, where are you staying?”
39 He said“Come and see.”
They stayed with him that day,
40 One of the two was Andrew.
41 He first found his brother Simon
“We have found the Messiah”
42 He brought him to Jesus.
43 The next day
Jesus found Philip and said…“Follow me.”
45 Philip found Nathan′a-el
“We have found him
whom Moses in the law and also the prophets wrote,
Jesus of Nazareth, the son of Joseph.”
46 “Come and see.”
47 Jesus saw Nathan′a-el coming to him
“Behold, an Israelite indeed, in whom is no guile!”
48 Nathan′a-el said…“How do you know me?”
Jesus answered.
Before Philip called you
“I saw you.”
50 “You shall see greater things” RSV

What is the general theme of the passage?
Kingdom evangelism of others is pretty obvious, but I wonder if it’s something bigger, like “us and them?”  John sees Jesus walking and identifies him as the Lamb of God.
What does it say about God (or Jesus or the Holy Spirit?)
Jesus notices.  He responds to their curiosity. He invites, “come and see.”
What does it say about people?
They’re curious. The two disciples have obviously already heard about the Lamb of God.  Maybe they’ve even heard of Jesus and what he’s done.  They know enough to call Him “Rabbi’ (which means Teacher).” They’re curious enough to follow Him.  Something has happened as a result of their simple curiosity and the time spent with Jesus that has convinced them He IS the Messiah.
Is there truth here for me?
God didn’t plan evangelism as busy-work for believers.  My human nature wants to narrow the scope of evangelism to reaching out to someone else. It’s simpler to believe sharing the truth I know about Jesus is all it takes to make Him attractive to others. It’s true that what I have recognized about Jesus can be enough to provoke curiosity in someone else.  The real truth is my faith has limited value to the faith of anyone else…but curiosity is catching.  The gift of curiosity and time, invested together with the invitation to “come and see” how Jesus will reveal Himself is what makes evangelism personal for “us and them.”

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Wednesday with John – 4 Words of Identity

Posted on January 26, 2022 | Leave a comment

John 1:19-34 [RSV] Here is a compilation of verbatim phrases and sentences copied from these verses.  This is a personal study method of identifying an important part of each verse and then letting them guide what I write. 

19 the testimony of John
Who are you?
20 He confessed, he did not deny
I am not the Christ.
21Are you Eli′jah?”
He said, “I am not.”
“Are you the prophet?”
he answered, “No.”
22 What do you say about yourself?
23 I am the voice of one crying in the wilderness,
24 they [priests and Levites] had been sent from the Pharisees
25 why are you baptizing, if you are neither the Christ, nor Eli′jah, nor the prophet?”
26 among you stands one whom you do not know,
27 he who comes after me
28 This took place in Bethany
29 Behold, the Lamb of God, who takes away the sin of the world!
31 I myself did not know him
32 And John bore witness,
“I saw the Spirit descend and it remained on him
33 I myself did not know him
He on whom you see the Spirit descend and remain
this is he who baptizes with the Holy Spirit.
34 I have seen and have borne witness
this is the Son of God.”

This is the kickoff week of the ”public” ministry of Jesus.  It must have been like drawing the short straw for the priests and Levites that were sent to that wild place to question John.  He could read between the lines; he knew their question “who are you?” was code for “do you claim to be yet another messiah?”  It’s interesting to think about John’s courage implied by this phrase, “he confessed, he did not deny.”  There were many false messianic claims and that phrase was a critical part of his answer, “I am not the Christ.” Perhaps the most dangerous part of his ministry was the act of baptism itself. John had just identified himself as “the voice of one crying in the wilderness” telling God’s chosen people they weren’t clean enough.  There was something more they needed to do: to be cleansed by baptism in preparation for the coming of the Messiah,  just as if they were the same as an impure Gentile.

John resisted identifying his own activity with anything [or anyone] other that what he’d just seen with his own eyes: “Behold, the Lamb of God, who takes away the sin of the world!” Twice John uses the odd phrase “I myself did not know him” but we know he did know WHO Jesus was. His confession was that now he recognized WHAT Jesus was, and that confirmed his own identity. “For this I came baptizing with water, that he [Jesus] might be revealed to Israel.”

He had become a disciple!  “And John bore witness, I saw the Spirit descend as a dove from heaven, and it remained on him…He on whom you see the Spirit descend and remain, this is He who baptizes with the Holy Spirit.”  What he’d witnessed with his own eyes was the work of the Holy Spirit.  He could personally confess to the reality of  that work as the  truth of  his own testimony: “this is the Son of God.”

Disciple: a personal follower
Witness: personal observation
Confession: personal knowledge
Testimony: the confession of a follower from personal knowledge

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Exodus – The Road Out

Posted on January 23, 2022 | Leave a comment

Exodus 1:1 These are the names of the sons of Israel who came to Egypt with Jacob, each with his household: 2 Reuben, Simeon, Levi, and Judah, 3 Is′sachar, Zeb′ulun, and Benjamin, 4 Dan and Naph′tali, Gad and Asher. 5 All the offspring of Jacob were seventy persons; Joseph was already in Egypt. 6 Then Joseph died, and all his brothers, and all that generation.  7 But the descendants of Israel were fruitful and increased greatly; they multiplied and grew exceedingly strong; so that the land was filled with them. 8 Now there arose a new king over Egypt, who did not know Joseph. 9 And he said to his people, “Behold, the people of Israel are too many and too mighty for us. 10 Come, let us deal shrewdly with them, lest they multiply, and, if war befall us, they join our enemies and fight against us and escape from the land”…12 But the more they were oppressed, the more they multiplied and the more they spread abroad. And the Egyptians were in dread of the people of Israel. RSV

Exodus literally means “the road out.” The word itself was adopted into English (via Latin) combining the Greek prefix ex- (meaning “out of”) and hodos, “road” or “way.”  This book is the way Moses’s story unfolds.  The facts of the story are yet another episode of the struggle of men [the generic pronoun] determined to control their circumstances.  History has erased the Egyptians memory.  They’ve forgotten, over time, that their salvation came through a family of blue-collar farming and shepherding immigrants and a man who’s wisdom saved their nation and their people from starvation and ruin: Joseph, who???

The Egyptians are now consumed by their “dread of the people of Israel” and their need to maintain control even if it means enslavement and genocide of those same people.  God has made sure that family will be remembered by name as the foundation of Moses’s story continues to unfold.  The title of the Book, Exodus, is more than the history of the promises for God’s people, then. Exodus is going to be like a contemporary mystery story where “in the beginning” we know the “who done it” and now It’s going to ask us to remember what has been forgotten in between – the circumstances, people, choices and time – and watch how the “exodus” then, has become the “way” to our deliverance, now.

“I am the way, and the truth, and the life;
no one comes to the Father, but by me.“
John 14:6

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