Deeper Waters

Okay. We’re going to resume our study of going through the New Testament. Tonight, we’re going to pick up again in the gospel of John. For those who are just now joining us, we are looking to come to a deeper understanding of the doctrine of the Trinity and going through the New Testament to see what it says about who Jesus is and his relationship to the Father and the Spirit. Tonight, we’re going to be looking at John 12:1-11.

¹Six days before the Passover, Jesus arrived at Bethany, where Lazarus lived, whom Jesus had raised from the dead. ²Here a dinner was given in Jesus’ honor. Martha served, while Lazarus was among those reclining at the table with him. ³Then Mary took about a pint of pure nard, an expensive perfume; she poured it on Jesus’ feet and wiped his feet with her hair. And the house was filled with the fragrance of the perfume. ⁴But one of his disciples, Judas Iscariot, who was later to betray him, objected, ⁵“Why wasn’t this perfume sold and the money given to the poor? It was worth a year’s wages.⁶He did not say this because he cared about the poor but because he was a thief; as keeper of the money bag, he used to help himself to what was put into it.

 ⁷“Leave her alone,” Jesus replied. ” It was intended that she should save this perfume for the day of my burial. ⁸You will always have the poor among you, but you will not always have me.”

 ⁹Meanwhile a large crowd of Jews found out that Jesus was there and came, not only because of him but also to see Lazarus, whom he had raised from the dead. ¹⁰So the chief priests made plans to kill Lazarus as well, ¹¹for on account of him many of the Jews were going over to Jesus and putting their faith in him.

The anointing of Jesus involves a gracious act done by the donator. A year’s worth of wages was nothing to sneeze at back then. (And it still isn’t today!) This was a most valuable perfume and it was all used on Christ. Judas was indignant. (He also had an ulterior motive as he often helped himself to what was donated to Christ.)

Jesus tells them that Mary has done a wonderful thing. The poor will always be there. Christ will not always be there. Let us be sure we don’t see the poor always being with us as a good thing. It is a reminder that there will always be evil and the church will always need to be there until the return of Christ. There will never cease to be a need for ministry.

The most interesting aspect in John’s account however is that Lazarus is there. In John 9, we saw the Jews expelled someone from the synagogue because of belief in Jesus. Now they’re escalating the threat. Not only do they want Jesus dead, they want to get rid of Lazarus. He’s a living testimony to what Jesus has done.

When we realize this, it should remind us of the kind of message Jesus was speaking. Jesus was not weak and meek. Jesus was an iconoclast. He was going after the greatest sacred cows that the Jews had and all the while making them worry about the Roman threat that was all around them. 

If Jesus had just gone around  teaching that we ought to love our neighbors and basic morality, then chances are we would not have heard much about him. There is no shortage of moral teachers after all. Who in a society that claimed to follow the Law of God would want to put to death someone teaching that?

Jesus was teaching much more and what was worse than that was that he was someone who seemed to be credible to many. He wasn’t some crackpot that everyone would dismiss. This guy was teaching this stuff and he was getting a following. He was teaching the strangest message the world had ever heard, that God had come among them and his kingdom was beginning and Jesus was the focus of all of it.

Is it any wonder they saw him as a threat?

And what’s sad is that they took him more seriously than we do. One should look at Jesus and either fall down at his feet and call him Lord or sentence him to the lowest level of Hell. As C.S. Lewis would say, he did not leave you any other options.

What’s your choice?

Hello everyone. We’re continuing our study of the doctrine of the Trinity and the self-understanding of Jesus. We’ve been going through the New Testament trying to find information on the doctrine, which is kind of like trying to find seashells on the beach. Yesterday, we read about the resurrection of Lazarus. Today, we’re going to see what the Jewish leaders said in response to this miracle of Jesus. We start at verse 45 of chapter 11 and continue to the end:

⁴⁵Therefore many of the Jews who had come to visit Mary, and had seen what Jesus did, put their faith in him. ⁴⁶But some of them went to the Pharisees and told them what Jesus had done. ⁴⁷Then the chief priests and the Pharisees called a meeting of the Sanhedrin.

   “What are we accomplishing?” they asked. “Here is this man performing many miraculous signs. ⁴⁸If we let him go on like this, everyone will believe in him, and then the Romans will come and take away both our place and our nation.”

 ⁴⁹Then one of them, named Caiaphas, who was high priest that year, spoke up, “You know nothing at all! ⁵⁰You do not realize that it is better for you that one man die for the people than that the whole nation perish.”

 ⁵¹He did not say this on his own, but as high priest that year he prophesied that Jesus would die for the Jewish nation, ⁵²and not only for that nation but also for the scattered children of God, to bring them together and make them one. ⁵³So from that day on they plotted to take his life.

 ⁵⁴Therefore Jesus no longer moved about publicly among the Jews. Instead he withdrew to a region near the desert, to a village called Ephraim, where he stayed with his disciples.

 ⁵⁵When it was almost time for the Jewish Passover, many went up from the country to Jerusalem for their ceremonial cleansing before the Passover. ⁵⁶They kept looking for Jesus, and as they stood in the temple area they asked one another, “What do you think? Isn’t he coming to the Feast at all?” ⁵⁷But the chief priests and Pharisees had given orders that if anyone found out where Jesus was, he should report it so that they might arrest him.

It’s interesting that there is no denial that this miracle has been done, but despite raising someone from the dead, the Jews STILL don’t believe that Jesus is the Messiah. (Kind of makes you wonder about all these people who thought the Jews would be gullible ancients who’d believe anything.)

What’s the concern? The concern is that Jesus will get a following and that this will turn into a revolution and the Romans will come and take away their nation. The tragedy about this is that the Romans came and took away their nation anyway.

Caiaphas says it is better that one perish than the whole nation. John tells us that he had prophesied earlier that year that Jesus would perish to bring all the children of God back. He prophesied that, but he did not understand it. He thought that the crucifixion of Jesus would unite the Jews in stading against Rome. God instead used the sacrifice of Christ to unite all the children of God, not just Jews, together in him. This is what we see in the book of Ephesians.

As a result of this, Jesus cannot be out in public. The decision has been made. The die is cast. The Jews seek to take the life of Jesus and the next time they meet, something is going to happen.

We’re going through the New Testament now and trying to come to a deeper understanding of the Trinity and how Jesus saw himself. Right now, we’re in the gospel of John. Today’s text would be quite long to put up so I’m simply going to suggest that my readers just read it themselves. We’re not going to be doing anything really expository. I just want to go through the story as a whole. Go to John 11 then and read about the resurrection of Lazarus.

The story begins with Mary and Martha sending word to Jesus that their brother Lazarus is sick. We’re told that these are three people that Jesus loves. This is something to note because when you look through Scripture, you will rarely find it said that Christ specifically loves someone.

Christ sticks around for awhile even though Lazarus is sick and then after awhile, tells the disciples that they are going there to wake him up since he has fallen asleep. The disciples don’t understand until Jesus is just blunt and he tells them that Lazarus is dead.

So off they go. Lazarus has been dead for four days. This is another point to bring out. In Jewish thought, it was believed that the soul stayed with the body for three days and then went away. Christ is hear showing that he can bring back the soul to the body by what he will do here.

Martha is the first one to see Jesus and when she sees him she says “If you had been here, my brother would not have died.” Jesus tells her her brother will live again, to which Martha points to the last day. Jesus says that he is the resurrection and the life and he asks Martha if she believes this.

At this, she affirms his identity. He is the Christ. He is the Son of God. He is the one who was to come into the world. All of this is tied together. This is a full statement on who Jesus is and it captures his identity very well.

At this, here comes the next sister Mary with the same statement of Martha. “If you had been here, my brother would not have died.” Jesus asks her to show him the tomb and at this, we get the shortest verse in the Bible.

Jesus wept.

We dare not deny the humanity of Christ. I am making it a point that we show that he fully possesses the nature of God in these blogs, but let us not for a moment think that he is not human. If we have a Jesus who is fully God and not human, we do not have the Jesus of the Bible and we are heretics.

When Jesus gets to the tomb, he asks that the stone be rolled away. At this, I love the beauty of the KJV. Martha says “Lord, by this time he stinketh.” 

The stone is rolled away and Jesus prays to the Father for all who are there so they will know the Father sent him and then shouts “Lazarus! Come out!” The people look and lo and behold, the dead man stands up and comes out.

It has even been said that Jesus specifically said “Lazarus” lest every dead body rise up.

Jesus showed who he was then in this, the grandest miracle in the gospel before his own resurrection. Jesus is the resurrection and the life. In him, all will rise and Lazarus is an example of the coming kingdom. Death will have no hold. Now Lazarus did die again of course, but the final resurrection will have no one dying agan.

In him was life, as John said at the start. In this chapter, he proved it.

Last time we left, our study of the Trinity was in the gospel of John and we were in the tenth chapter. If you’re just now reading this, I definitely recommend reading yesterday’s blog to understand what is going on in this chapter. To give a brief summary, last time, Jesus said “I and the Father are one” which we saw as a statement of him affirming his deity. Today, we’re going to see the response to that by the Jews in verses 31-39 of the same chapter.

³¹Again the Jews picked up stones to stone him, ³²but Jesus said to them, “I have shown you many great miracles from the Father. For which of these do you stone me?”

 ³³“We are not stoning you for any of these,” replied the Jews, “but for blasphemy, because you, a mere man, claim to be God.”

 ³⁴Jesus answered them, “Is it not written in your Law, ‘I have said you are gods’? ³⁵If he called them ‘gods,’ to whom the word of God came—and the Scripture cannot be broken— ³⁶what about the one whom the Father set apart as his very own and sent into the world? Why then do you accuse me of blasphemy because I said, ‘I am God’s Son’?³⁷Do not believe me unless I do what my Father does. ³⁸But if I do it, even though you do not believe me, believe the miracles, that you may know and understand that the Father is in me, and I in the Father.” ³⁹Again they tried to seize him, but he escaped their grasp.

To begin with, they pick up the stones to stone Jesus. Jesus points to his miracles and asks for which one of them they are stoning him. They answer they stone him not because of the miracles but because he, a man, claims to be God. 

Let’s be sure on this. The Jews did understand what Jesus was saying very well. The problem was not that they did not understand what he said. The problem was that they understood what he said and did not believe it. 

Jesus gives an interesting argument in reply and I  recommend going back and reading it. What did he mean by that? “You are gods?” This is an argument that the Mormons will often use and even if the Mormons did not, this is still a confusing passage to some and we should study it not just to answer the cults but for our own edification. Keep in mind that that is also important when studying the Trinity as we are. If you think the purpose of this is only to beat up Jehovah’s Witnesses, you’ve missed the boat. This is to help us in our education and our knowledge of the holy.

Jesus quoted Psalm 82. Let’s look at that Psalm.

¹ God presides in the great assembly; 
       he gives judgment among the “gods”:

 ² “How long will you defend the unjust 
       and show partiality to the wicked? 
       Selah

 ³ Defend the cause of the weak and fatherless; 
       maintain the rights of the poor and oppressed.

 ⁴ Rescue the weak and needy; 
       deliver them from the hand of the wicked.

 ⁵ “They know nothing, they understand nothing. 
       They walk about in darkness; 
       all the foundations of the earth are shaken.

 ⁶ “I said, ‘You are “gods”; 
       you are all sons of the Most High.’

 ⁷ But you will die like mere men; 
       you will fall like every other ruler.”

 ⁸ Rise up, O God, judge the earth, 
       for all the nations are your inheritance.

I take this to be a reference to Israel as the statement pointed to commands they were to follow and they were in the assembly of YHWH. However, they were not fulfilling the role they were supposed to be doing. Therefore, while they are gods in their position of judging, they will die like mere men. It’s a mocking Psalm. To our Mormon friend, keep in mind it does not say “You will become gods.” It says “You are gods.” It’s present tense.

Jesus then says that the law cannot be broken, a strong teaching on the inerrancy of the OT, and since that is the case, then if these wicked and evil men have the right to be called gods, then surely he, the righteous one, has the right to be called the Son of God. (Note that being the Son of God is seen as being equal to God.)

Jesus is using an argument that the Jews would call “qal wahomer.” We call it “A fortiori.” It’s the lesser to greater argument.It starts with a lesser point and uses that support a greater point. Let’s look at some other examples. The first from John 7.

²¹Jesus said to them, “I did one miracle, and you are all astonished. ²²Yet, because Moses gave you circumcision (though actually it did not come from Moses, but from the patriarchs), you circumcise a child on the Sabbath. ²³Now if a child can be circumcised on the Sabbath so that the law of Moses may not be broken, why are you angry with me for healing the whole man on the Sabbath?

And from Matthew 7:

⁹“Which of you, if his son asks for bread, will give him a stone? ¹⁰Or if he asks for a fish, will give him a snake? ¹¹If you, then, though you are evil, know how to give good gifts to your children, how much more will your Father in heaven give good gifts to those who ask him! ¹²So in everything, do to others what you would have them do to you, for this sums up the Law and the Prophets.

Luke 12:24:

Consider the ravens: They do not sow or reap, they have no storeroom or barn; yet God feeds them. And how much more valuable you are than birds!

The argument is in fact an argument for the deity of Christ. The Jews understood that. That is why they picked up stones to stone him yet again.

Let us hope that the opponents of Jesus do not take him more seriously than we do.

I first wish to thank Kelp for his comment. It is something that I as a teacher delight in hearing. One skill to work on in communicating is to say the point well so that it can be understood and as in few words as possible. I try to make my blog posts lengthy enough to be substantial, but short enough to be enjoyed and really thought about.

Tonight, we’re continuing going through the New Testament to come to a deeper understanding of who Christ is and the doctrine of the Trinity. We’re going to be in John 10 looking at verses 22-30.

²²Then came the Feast of Dedication at Jerusalem. It was winter, ²³and Jesus was in the temple area walking in Solomon’s Colonnade. ²⁴The Jews gathered around him, saying, “How long will you keep us in suspense? If you are the Christ, tell us plainly.”

 ²⁵Jesus answered, “I did tell you, but you do not believe. The miracles I do in my Father’s name speak for me, ²⁶but you do not believe because you are not my sheep.²⁷My sheep listen to my voice; I know them, and they follow me. ²⁸I give them eternal life, and they shall never perish; no one can snatch them out of my hand. ²⁹My Father, who has given them to me, is greater than all; no one can snatch them out of my Father’s hand. ³⁰I and the Father are one.”

Let’s note also that earlier in this chapter, Jesus has said that he is the good shepherd. If a Jew knew of anyone who was the good shepherd, they would have thought of Psalm 23 and known that YHWH is truly the shepherd of his people. Let’s look at what is said here.

The question is about who Jesus is again. That’s something else to consider when looking at Jesus. There is no question of who other religious leaders were generally. It is their teachings that are brought into question. For Jesus, it was he himself who was brought into question. The debate has always been not over what he really taught, although that is debated, but who he really thought he was.

When we get to this passage, he starts by describing the works that he is doing. He states that he gives those who believe life everlasting and no one can snatch them out of his hand. He then says that the Father who gives them is greater than all and no one can snatch them out of his hand. Notice the work is done by both and the same applies to both.

He then gets to the conclusion. “I and the Father are one.”

The word here is neuter and it refers to one thing and not one person. Tertullian also saw something in saying that Jesus used the word “are” instead of “am” indicating two different persons, thus indicating that this verse does not really back modalism.

For our purposes, we see Jesus aligning himself with God in a unique fashion. We know later that this was seen as blasphemy. It cannot be saying that being one in will was blasphemy. The Jews would certainly want to align themselves with the will of God. It was rightly understood that Jesus was claiming to share in the nature of the Father in a totally unique way, so unique that the two can be called one in nature.

What was the response?

We shall find out tomorrow.

Tonight, we’re going to resume our Trinitarian study of Scripture. For those who are just joining us, we are going through the Bible looking for clues to the concept of the Trinity and the self-understanding of Christ. John 9 will be our chapter to discuss tonight. Normally, I would put up the text, but we’re going to be focusing on the whole theme of the passage rather than individual verses by and large. I leave it to the reader to read John 9 on their own then.

The story is familiar enough to those of us who have spent much time in the Christian tradition. Jesus and his apostles come upon a man who is blind and has been blind from birth and the apostles want to know who is responsible that this man is born blind. Was it him or his parents? After all, if bad stuff happened to someone, it must be because of sin somewhere. (You’d really think the message of Job would have been learned by now but seeing as we still haven’t learned it today, it must be a really hard one. No wonder God gave us a whole book on that one topic.)

Jesus says it was neither him or his parents. His suffering was so that the glory of God could be revealed through him. This should be a comfort to all of us who suffer that are Christians and last time I checked, that’s every Christian alive at this point. We do suffer and some suffering could be used for further glory. It could be we are suffering just so God can do an amazing work in our lives.

Jesus heals the man by telling him to go and wash. Now he could certainly have healed him any number of ways. There’s an old joke that Jesus healed one man by touching, one by spitting, and one by having him go wash. If that had happened today, you’d have three denominations of the touchites, the spittites, and the washites. Why did Jesus use washing this time? Probably because of what we learn later, that it was a Sabbath that this happened.

This gets the man in trouble when he is identified later by the Jewish leaders. After all, he washed on a Sabbath which would mean that he violated the Sabbath. The man tells them that it was Jesus who had healed him.  Just in case this is a phony healing, they call in his parents to see if it truly is the man. (Keep in mind that according to our skeptics today, the ancients were gullible people who believed every miracle report. Apparently not.) His parents say that he is their son and he was born blind, but if you want to know how he sees, ask him. He’s a big boy. He can speak for himself. They said this because the Jews had threatened to expel anyone from the synagogue who claimed to believe in Jesus. In such a society, the shame one would have for that would be terrible.

The debate that follows between the blind man and the leaders is quite hysterical as this blind man who would no doubt have never even read the Scriptures for himself is humiliating the Jewish leaders in debate with the simple point that he was once blind and now he sees and since God doesn’t hear the prayers of sinful men like that, then God is working through Jesus. The blind man’s view of Jesus keeps moving up as they discuss. He first says he is a prophet and then asks if the leaders want to become his disciples also. Thus, he considered himself a disciple of this Jesus.

At that, he is thrown out of the synagogue where Jesus meets him. Jesus asks him if he believes in the Son of Man. The blind man wants to know who that is and Jesus says that it is the one speaking to him. The man says then that he believes and worships Jesus.

A number of points to bring out. First, Jesus is worshipped. The progression has moved beyond the disciple of a great teacher to a far higher view of this teacher. Second, persecution has begun. This man has been thrown out of the synagogue. In chapter 7, we saw the attempt to arrest Jesus. In chapter 8, we saw stoning him. Now, it is moving to his followers.

Finally, the Pharisees ask if they are blind, and this is probably a conversation that happened later on and this story is used to help explain the point. Jesus tells them that if they were blind, they would not have guilt. The problem is not their ignorance. The problem is they claim knowledge. Since they ought to know better, their guilt remains. The ones who were seen as seeing the clearest were condemned by Christ.

Tomorrow, we shall continue.