Pastor Scott Jonas
1/7/18
John 5
I am Listening
We continue through the Gospel of
John, so turn to John chapter 5. In John 4, Jesus meets the Samaritan woman at the
well. It was an encounter between a woman who had needs...and Jesus who met her
needs. It was a gift...He offers to all
who asks and the results are “Blessing"! This morning we begin in chapter
5 with verses 1-17.
Imagine the testimony of that healed
man. Here is a man who was an invalid for 38 years. He was seemingly picked out
randomly by Jesus. All the man had to do is answer “yes” when Jesus asked him,
“Do you want to be healed?” Suddenly, because of the mercy of Jesus, the man has
a new life. He
can walk. He can work and stop begging. He can be a
productive member of society. He has the type of testimony that is impressive.
He was weak and broken but Jesus saved him and restored him to full health.
We tend to do that with testimonies.
We are drawn towards the ones in which someone is lost and then found. Someone
who was a drunk, found Jesus and then became sober. We want to see Jesus answer
a prayer completely and instantly right before our very eyes. But this man, whose name we do not know, was
not the only broken man at the pool that day. This pool of Bethzatha drew
people to its healing waters.
Modern people know that natural
spring water has limited health benefits, but these people believed in
something bigger. The rumor was that an angel stirred the pool. Whenever
bubbles rose up in the spring that the first man to enter them would be healed.
Verse 3 says, “In these lay a multitude of the blind, lame and paralyzed.” They
all came to the pool with the hopes of being healed.
Some probably were superstitious
pagans, putting their hope in a story. Others
had no faith, they just wanted to try anything. But maybe there was a faithful
Jew there that day who had been praying for healing. Jesus picked just one to
be healed and it wasn’t him. What about that guy? What about us when we pray
for healing and it doesn’t happen the way we ask? What about us?
I had coffee with a friend one day and he asked me the
question, “what’s the purpose of prayer? Is it about trying to change the mind
of God or what?” I got kind of excited. My eyes widened. I puckered my lips.
Because these are the types of situations pastors love. When a believer asks a
faithful question and we get to unravel the answer with them.
My friend brought up Abraham.
Remember when God told him that he was going to destroy Sodom and Gomorrah
because of their great sin towards other people. Abraham spoke to God, in other
words “prayed”, and asked God to change his mind. What if Abraham found 50
righteous people? Would God spare the city? What about 40? 30? 20? 10? (abraham
sounded like how my daughter used to negotiate her bedtime) Finally God agreed
that if Abraham found 10 righteous people then God would not destroy the city.
My friend asked, “Is God changing ‘his mind?”
The short answer is “No.” God knew
that there was not a single righteous person in Sodom. It was full of
murderers, rapists and those who take advantage of the weak. They would have
robbed or done worse to beggars like those in Jesus’ time. But God went through
this conversation because He wanted Abraham to see this for himself. Abraham
could not find a righteous man. He finally had to admit that God was right and
that He knew what he was doing. Someone once asked C.S. Lewis why he prays and
he said,
“I pray because I can’t help myself. I pray because I’m
helpless. I pray
because the need flows out of me all the time- waking and
sleeping. It
doesn’t change God- it changes me.”
We ask why does God answer some
prayers and not others? The path to unraveling the answer is in chapter 5
verses 18-30. This was why the Jews were seeking all the more to kill him,
because not only was he breaking the Sabbath, but he was even calling God his
own Father, making himself equal with God.
19 So Jesus said to them, “Truly, truly, I say to you, the Son can do
nothing of his own accord, but only what he sees the Father doing. For whatever
the Father[e] does, that the Son does likewise. 20 For the Father loves the Son
and shows him all that he himself is doing. And greater works than these will
he show him, so that you may marvel. 21 For as the Father raises the dead and gives
them life, so also the Son gives life to whom he will. 22 For the Father judges
no one, but has given all judgment to the Son, 23 that all may honor the Son,
just as they honor the Father. Whoever does not honor the Son does not honor
the Father who sent him. 24 Truly, truly, I say to you, whoever hears my word
and believes him who sent me has eternal life. He does not come into judgment,
but has passed from death to life. 25
“Truly, truly, I say to you, an hour is coming, and is now here, when the dead will
hear the voice of the Son of God, and those who hear will live. 26 For as the Father
has life in himself, so he has granted the Son also to have life in himself. 27
And he has given him authority to execute judgment, because he is the Son of
Man. 28 Do not marvel at this, for an hour is coming when all who are in the tombs
will hear his voice 29 and come out, those who have done good to the resurrection
of life, and those who have done evil to the resurrection of judgment. 30 “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.
Jesus reveals that the reason he
knows so much is because he watches his father. He copies his father. He obeys
his father. I don’t know if you know this but John is the only Gospel with no
parables. The word parable is not in John. The stories are absent as well. No
good samaritan. No Sower. No prodigal son. No lost sheep. But we just read what
some call a pseudo parable. It doesn’t teach through a story like a parable,
but it does give an image. The image of a son who is the apprentice of a
father. He learns at the FAther’s feet, not unlike Jesus probably did from his
earthly father Joseph the carpenter. You watch and imitate. The father has all
of the knowledge and wisdom which is passed down
lovingly to the son so that someday it can be passed down to
his children.
In this image of apprenticeship, the
son may not want to follow his father’s ways. He may not want to get up early
and work hard. But the father wants a good life for his heir. The father will
teach everything he knows to his son. That’s what loving father’s do. Jesus
came not to be a carpenter but to share God’s will. But first he has to bend
his will to the Father. Jesus said, “I seek not my will but the will of he who sent
me.”
Let’s talk a little about what the
words “Will of God” mean? Jesus told us
to pray, “Thy will be done on earth as it is in heaven.” What does the Bible
mean by “thy will be done.?” The greek words for “will” are “thelema” and
“boulema.” They have three different meanings based on context. Let’s look at
them. The first meaning of “will of God” is the sovereign, efcacious will of God.
RC Sproul says, “When the Bible speaks of the will of God in this sense, it is
describing the will that causes whatever He decrees to come to pass.” So on Christmas
day I preached on “Let there be light.” That was God’s sovereign will. He
wanted light to be created and he made it happen. God spoke and the lights came
on. Likewise, Jesus commands Lazarus to rise from the dead and that command was
efcacious. Lazarus couldn’t help but obey instantly and immediately just as the
stars obeyed the Father.
The Second meaning of the will of God
is what is called the perceptive will of God. A precept is a law or command.
God commands us to “pray.” That is his law. That is his will. We can disobey
this command, yet it is still his will. The same goes for every law in the
Bible. He wants it to happen but he allows us the freedom to disobey him. The
people of Sodom disobeyed the law of God so they disobeyed the will of God in
this sense.
The third meaning of the will of God
is what pleases God. The bible says that that it pleases God that all people be
saved. It does not please God that people are far from him. Yet, some have
turned away from God. What pleases God is the third aspect of God’s will. Jesus
says in John Chapter 5 that “I seek not my will but the will of him who sent
me.” That means that when Jesus came as a human, he had to bend his will to the
father’s. Jesus bent his sovereign will.
Jesus bent his perceptive will. Jesus bent his pleasing will. It was not about
what Jesus would allow to happen; it was about what the Father allowed to
happen. It was not about Jesus’ law but about the Father’s law. It was not
about what pleased Jesus but what pleased the father.
When Jesus was in the Garden before
his death, he pleaded for the father to take this cup from him. Jesus was not
pleased to die on the cross. The father was not pleased either. But it was the
Father’s sovereign will so that all of us could be saved. When we pray, we are
bending our will towards God’s will. God has a plan; we have a plan. Our plan
has to give way to the Father’s. We know what
pleases us but we need to bend that to what pleases the Father.
A year ago a friend of ours in her
40s had a brain anuerism. We prayed for healing.
Just like the friend’s of the blind and lame in Jesus’ day.
But we knew that that might not be God’s will. It pleases him to bring healing
but that full healing may not come until the final day. We prayed that it would
happen completely now. But we recognized that our will needs to bend to the
FAther’s will. He has a plan. He gave us his will through the Bible so that we
may know him. It pleases him to hear our prayers. So we pray because we pray
because we can’t help ourselves. We pray because We’re helpless. We pray
because the need flows out of us all the time- waking and sleeping. It doesn’t
change God it changes us.”