As I have said before many times, every miracle Jesus performed in the gospels is presented to teach us a spiritual parable.  It is important to understand that.  Not every miracle that Jesus did is recorded in scripture.  John will say later that if everything that Jesus did while He was on earth was written down, that all the books of the world could not contain them.  But John said in chapter 20 verse 31 that the signs that he did record, are written so that you might believe that Jesus is the Christ, the Son of God, and that believing you might have life in HIs name.

So the miracle we are looking at today has spiritual significance and symbolism that goes beyond the mere physical healing of blindness.  Yes, Jesus has compassion on this blind man and 5 other blind men during His ministry that we know of.  But no where in scripture do we see that Jesus healed every person of every disease.  Jesus also raised three people from the dead.  But never in scripture do we read that Jesus raised every dead person.  So while compassion may be one of the lessons we can learn from this text, it is certainly not the primary lesson.

The primary lesson deals with an important theological question regarding the origin of sin and the response of God to that spiritual condition.  It deals with spiritual blindness and all that represents. But to fully comprehend this text though I want to remind you of what has just preceded it in the previous chapter.  Because I think this event is tied to the teaching that Jesus gave in the last chapter.  

You will remember that in the running dialogue that Jesus had with the Pharisees during the Feast of Tabernacles, there were some claims made by the Pharisees concerning their father, who they said was Abraham, and the insinuation that Jesus had been born of fornication.  

So the Pharisees were holding up their pedigree as sons of Abraham, and thus they considered themselves righteous in the sight of God.  But Jesus repeatedly told them you don’t act like sons of Abraham.  He said you don’t do the deeds of Abraham.  You don’t have spiritual discernment like Abraham.  And in fact, you do the deeds of your real father, the devil. That didn’t go over too well with those guys.  So they got angry.  And  they picked up stones to kill Him.  But Jesus disappeared into the crowd and slipped away.

Now this chapter opens  with Jesus and His disciples as they were leaving the temple, and they pass by a blind beggar sitting by the gate of the temple.  That was a popular spot for beggars.  They knew people were coming into the temple to offer alms to God, and one of the ways that Jews were taught you could remove sin from your life was by giving alms to the poor.  So the poor, the in-firmed, the blind, paralyzed and sick people who had no other recourse but to beg for their income found the temple gates a lucrative spot.

Now John writes that this man was blind from birth.  And that phrase has caused some commentators to go to great extremes to explain how that should be interpreted.  Some of them say that meant that many Jews believed in reincarnation and so the disciples thought that this man perhaps had sinned in a past life and consequently was blind from birth.  But I think that misses the obvious interpretation, which is that John is writing this almost 60 years afterwards.  And from his historical viewpoint he is able to say, this man was blind from birth.  The disciples did not necessarily know that.  They assumed that he became blind at some point in his life due to committing some grievous sin, or that if he had been born blind, that his parents must have committed some terrible sin.  But I believe that it is simply that John is writing long after this event, and he is letting us know at the outset that this man had been born blind.  That indicates the totality of this man’s condition, the hopelessness of this man’s condition. 

So I believe that based on the dialogue found in the last chapter regarding the nature of the father exhibited in the sons, Jesus’ disciples seeing this blind man by the gate, ask this question; ““Rabbi, who sinned, this man or his parents, that he would be born blind?”  That’s kind of the logical assumption, isn’t it?  When we see someone suffering, someone having physical problems, it’s tempting to think that somehow they brought it on themselves.  

Job had that happen to him.  His friends came to visit and ended up accusing him of some hidden sin because all this tragedy had happened in his life.  They argued that God blessed those that were good people and cursed those that were bad people.  And I think that kind of thinking exists today, even within the church.  The prosperity doctrine preachers teach that God just wants to bless you and give you all kinds of things to prosper you and make your life fulfilling and enriched.  That is the promise of the prosperity gospel.  That if you belong to God, He will bless you and won’t hold any good thing from you.  And so we believe that a new car is a good thing.  A new house is a good thing.  A great paying job  is a good thing.  So we equate physical success or prosperity with spiritual blessing.  

And the opposite also is often true.  For instance, we see someone who is addicted to alcohol, and they are looked upon as someone who brought the ravages of that kind of life upon themselves.  We see someone poor and destitute, and we think that it’s probably because they aren’t good workers, they must have brought their poverty upon themselves.  

But I think that is far too general a categorization.  The fact is that there are plenty of healthy sinners and a lot of sick saints which contradict that view.  However, the Bible does teach that sickness and death are the result of living in a fallen, sinful world.  Romans 5:12 says, “Wherefore, as by one man sin entered into the world, and death by sin; and so death passed upon all men, for that all have sinned.” So original sin is the origin of death.  But there are multiple examples of suffering in the Bible that show that not all suffering is a direct result of sin.  Again, Job is the foremost example of a man that God declared was righteous.  God pointed Job out to Satan as someone who lived an exemplary life.  Yet Job suffered more than most of us could ever imagine.  And Joseph was another man who suffered for years and yet was innocent.  Paul was yet another who suffered imprisonment and beatings, as well as the other apostles.  There are many examples of saints who suffered without cause.

So Jesus answers His disciples’ question by saying, “It was neither that this man sinned, nor his parents; but it was so that the works of God might be displayed in him.”  So what Jesus is affirming is that this man’s blindness was not a direct result of either his sin or his parents. Notice that Jesus doesn’t say that sickness is not the result of  original sin.  Sin caused all life which was perfect when God created it, to become corrupted.  And that corruption has permeated every fiber of creation.  

I believe that is what Romans 8:22 is talking about which says, “For we know that the whole creation groans and suffers the pains of childbirth together until now.”  Paul said that the creation was subject to slavery from that corruption, and was anxiously awaiting the day when God would bring freedom from that corruption of sin that is in the world.  In fact, I think the argument could be made that the further we get from the initial perfection of creation, the more subject to corruption not only creation becomes, but also our bodies.  Our cells are more susceptible to cancer and other illnesses because we are further removed from the original creation.  Now I cannot be dogmatic about such things because I am not a scientist.  But there are some that do suggest this to be the case; that contrary to the theory of evolution,  all biological life is breaking down, not getting better.  

But back to our main point, Jesus dismissed the idea that this man’s blindness was a direct result of individual sin.  Instead, He asserts that this particular man was born blind so that the works of God might be displayed in him.

The theologian Ellicott said, “There is a chain connecting the sin of humanity and its woe, but the links are not traceable by the human eye. In the Providence of God vicarious suffering is often the noble lot of the noblest members of our race. No burden of human sorrow was ever so great as that borne by Him who knew no human sin.”  He is saying that Jesus Himself through His sinless life disproves the principle that suffering is the consequence of sin. So it is not in our purview to determine the cause of human suffering.

In fact, the Bible indicates that more often than not, the opposite is true.  It is not the judgment of God that brings people to repentance, but according to Romans 2:4, it says the kindness of God is intended to lead people to repentance.  Over and over again the scriptures declare that “the Lord is slow to anger, compassionate and gracious.”  He will one day judge every man according to his works, but for the most part, that judgment is postponed until the day of judgment and for now God is patient, not willing that any should perish without salvation.  In an agrarian age when rain was considered to be a blessing from God, Jesus said in Matthew 5:45, “for He causes His sun to rise on the evil and the good, and sends rain on the righteous and the unrighteous.”  God is merciful, and patient, and long suffering, and does not reward us according to what we deserve, but is merciful, that perhaps we might turn to Him and be saved.

So Jesus said, “It was neither that this man sinned, nor his parents; but it was so that the works of God might be displayed in him.” Now what are the works of God that would be displayed in this blind man?  Notice that works is plural.  It is not a singular work of God.  It is not therefore, simply that God would heal him from blindness.  It is much more multifaceted than that.  But as we look at the complete chapter, what began with the compassion of Christ for physical healing, results in seeing eyes, which produces faith and obedience and culminates later that day with spiritual healing.  The work of God is salvation.  This is the real goal of Christ’s work.  It is not God’s will that all men would be healed of every sickness, but it is true  according to 2Peter 3:9, that “the Lord is… not willing that any should perish, but that all should come to repentance.”  This is the primary work of God through Christ.  Christ came to reconcile men to God through His substitionary death on the cross.  

So then to some extent, evil actually furthers the work of God in the world. It is in conquering and abolishing evil that God’s great attributes are manifested. The question for us then is not where suffering has come from, but what we are to do with it.

And the Lord answers that concern as well in vs.4, “We must work the works of Him who sent Me as long as it is day; night is coming when no one can work.”  Note first of all, that we are included in Christ’s work.  The KJV had interpreted that as “I must work the works,”  but most translators later determined that the best manuscripts indicate “we”, and not “I.”  And that is an important principle that we need to emphasize.  We are saved to do the works of God.  Ephesians 2:10 says, “For we are His workmanship, created in Christ Jesus for good works, which God prepared beforehand so that we would walk in them.”   So we are co workers with Christ.  He is the head, and we are the body.  We are supposed to be His hands and His feet, doing the works of God, even as He did the works of God on the earth.  

This is our purpose now that we are saved.  What a contrast that is to most modern conceptions of Christianity.  We have this idea that God just wants to help us achieve our goals, and wants to help us live our best life now, to be happy here on earth.  That may or may not be a side effect of doing God’s work, but it isn’t the goal.  The goal is to do the works of God.  

This phrase, “while it is day, and the night comes” what does it mean?  Well, He’s talking about our lives.  The day symbolizes our life, and the night symbolizes death.  It is very likely that it was Saturday afternoon at that time, the Sabbath evening.  And the sun which would soon set was the illustration for  the analogy that our lives are short, and so we must make full use of the time we have left.  Let me emphasize that this morning.  Life is short.  I heard someone say that this week.  Unfortunately, they made the wrong determination based on that.  They determined that since life was short they had better live for today.  That is the world’s view.  The Grass Roots in 1967 sang “Sha la la la la la live for today!” That was the theme song of my generation.  And that’s still the mantra of the world, to live for today.  Life is short, live it up.

But that cannot be the theme of a true disciple.  Because we don’t live for today, we live for eternity.  We live for the day our Savior will return and take us to be with Him.  That’s when we will get our reward for the work that we have done here on earth.  But this person that said that life is short  is afraid to live for tomorrow.  They are afraid because this life is all they can see, all that they feel they can be sure of. In regards to eternity they are blind.  And so they cannot let go of today, they can’t let go of the world, they can’t let go of what they think can give them happiness.  And as such, though they should gain the whole world they will lose their own soul.  

Disciples must work, Jesus said, they must work the works of God.  The day is fleeting, and the night is coming when no man can work.  And when that night comes, we shall then find ourselves standing at the throne of God, awaiting our reward, awaiting our judgement for what we have done with this life that God has so graciously given us.  I saw a video some time ago of a noted preacher, and he was illustrating the position of so many Christians who were afraid to step out and work for God, by balancing on a balance beam that he had set up in his church.  And as he illustrated the fear of following Christ he crouched down on all fours on the balance beam as one might do who is afraid of falling off.  As he illustrated the life of this Christian, he ended up laying down on the beam, holding onto it with both arms and wrapping his legs around the beam.  And then he showed the end of the life of this person, as they jumped off the balance beam and lifted both arms in the air like a gymnast might do at the end of their repertoire, and taking a little bow.  And the preacher then described God’s reaction to this life, this Christian performance, with an expression of surprise and incredulity, like He doesn’t know how you expect Him to judge such a performance.  You didn’t do anything.  You just held on to the balance beam. You held onto the world, and failed to do anything for eternity.

Well, what exactly is the work that we are to do?  It is to do as Jesus did.  Jesus said in the next verse, that as long as He was in the world, He was the light of the world.  He came to shine the light of God, the light of God’s truth to a world that was in darkness.  Darkness and blindness in this case being synonymous. That was His purpose.  Isaiah 60:1-3 speaks of the day of the Messiah coming to Israel, saying “Arise, shine; for your light has come,And the glory of the LORD has risen upon you. For behold, darkness will cover the earthAnd deep darkness the peoples;But the LORD will rise upon youAnd His glory will appear upon you. Nations will come to your light, and kings to the brightness of your rising.”

Notice in that Old Testament prophecy that it says their light has come, that is the Messiah.  But there is also the instruction for the church  to arise and shine in response to that light.  We are to shine the light of the Son even as the moon reflects the light of the sun.  That is our purpose.  Jesus said in Matthew 5:16  “Let your light shine before men in such a way that they may see your good works, and glorify your Father who is in heaven.”

How do we do we reflect then the light of Christ?  Well, I believe that is illustrated in the spiritual healing that Jesus does with the blind man.  This man who had been in darkness since birth.  That is the situation the whole world is in.  Ephesians 2:1 says we are born already dead in our trespasses and sins.  Since birth we have been blind.  And if not for the love and compassion of God we would die in our sins.  

Ephesians 2 continues, saying “you were dead in  your trespasses and sins in which you formerly walked according to the course of this world, according to the prince of the power of the air, of the spirit that is now working in the sons of disobedience. Among them we too all formerly lived in the lusts of our flesh, indulging the desires of the flesh and of the mind, and were by nature children of wrath, even as the rest.  But God, being rich in mercy, because of His great love with which He loved us, even when we were dead in our transgressions, made us alive together with Christ (by grace you have been saved),  and raised us up with Him, and seated us with Him in the heavenly places in Christ Jesus, so that in the ages to come He might show the surpassing riches of His grace in kindness toward us in Christ Jesus. For by grace you have been saved through faith; and that not of yourselves, it is the gift of God; not as a result of works, so that no one may boast.”  

So first of all we see illustrated here the grace of God. John 9:6-7 “When He had said this, He spat on the ground, and made clay of the spittle, and applied the clay to his eyes, and said to him, “Go, wash in the pool of Siloam” (which is translated, Sent). So he went away and washed, and came back seeing.”  Notice that Jesus initiates this divine act of grace.  God so loved the world, that He gave His only Son.  The world was hopeless, in darkness, lost, trapped in their sin.  But God.  But God so loved the world, that He sent Jesus to be our Savior.  So the first part of our work is to share the grace of God with a world in which is in darkness. 

This process that Jesus uses to heal this man is interesting.  There is much that could be said about the process of how He healed him.  But I would point out that out of six recorded times when Jesus healed the blind, this is the only time He spat on the ground and made clay.  So there is no formula here that we might use to heal people. There is no supernatural essence in spittle. So I wouldn’t advise you to go around spitting on sick people.  You might end up really suffering for Christ.

However, I think that we can learn some things from Jesus’ method. First of all, as I already mentioned, we see the sovereign grace of God.  The Lord chose to heal this man, and not visa versa.  We are told to believe, we are told to receive, but at the same time, it is necessary for God to take the initiative if the blind are to see.  Secondly, we see a correlation between the first act of the creation of man, and this act of recreation.  Salvation is a new creation.  Not a reformation, but a creation.  We are new creatures. 2 Cor. 5:17 says,  “Therefore if any man be in Christ, he is a new creature: old things are passed away; behold, all things are become new.” 

In the first creation, God made man from the dust of the ground. In this new creation, taking dead eyes and making them new, the Lord again uses the dust of the ground.  I don’t know for sure why God chose to make man from dust.  All the other creatures that God made He simply spoke them into being.  Even the sun and stars were spoken into existence.  But for man, we see God take clay into HIs hands, and mold it, and make it in His image.  To me, that indicates that the creation of man was an act of love.  It reminds me of an artist, a sculptor, a potter, who shapes an inanimate object with his hands and in so doing instills in it the love of the artist.  It bears the image of the one who shaped it. And so we see in the touch of Jesus, the love of God.  He could have healed with just a word.  But He chose to use His hands, to touch, and shape as an illustration of His love.

I also see in that mixture of spittle and dust, a symbolism of the need for God in man.  Christ was fully God and fully man and thus was uniquely able to be our Savior.  And so the divinity of Christ is symbolized by His saliva, the water, the living water that He said in the previous chapter would flow from your innermost being, this He mixed with common dirt, symbolizing man.  And that perfect mixture, the God-man, was the formula God used to save the world from darkness.  

Jesus then after rubbing this mixture in his eyes, tells him to go to the pool of Siloam and wash.  Now first in that command we see the need for obedience and faith, and the fact that they are indivisible.  Faith and obedience cannot be separated.  Far too many people today think that faith is an emotion, or that faith is an intellectual assent.  But faith is trust.  And to trust requires obedience.  You cannot say that one is saved by faith, but that is only an emotional response to an altar call.  Or that you are saved by faith, but that is only believing that God exists.  That is not saving faith.  Saving faith is exemplified in the life of Abraham, as Hebrews 11:8 states, “By faith Abraham, when he was called, obeyed by going out to a place which he was to receive for an inheritance; and he went out, not knowing where he was going.”  Abraham, obeyed.  That was the action of his faith.  So this blind man acts in faith.  He obeys and goes where Jesus said to go.  Some of you today think you are saved because of an emotional response you had during a church service at some point in your life.  Some of you think you are saved because you believe in the existence of God.  But I suggest that you can know you are saved because you do the works of God.  Because you obey the word of God.  That is how Jesus said you can tell that God is your Father.

Also, note that the pool of Siloam is the same pool that the priests went to draw water from during the Feast of the Tabernacles.  And as they poured the water into the funnels and it gushed down upon the altar, Jesus stood up and cried out in the midst of the temple ceremony, “If anyone is thirsty, let him come to Me and drink. He who believes in Me, as the Scripture said, ‘From his innermost being will flow rivers of living water.’” So Jesus is reaffirming in His directive what He declared in the temple.  That by believing in Him, you might receive the living water which will spring up in your soul, resulting in eternal life.  This is the significance of the pool of Siloam. 

And then Jesus tells him to wash.  And he did so, and was able to see.  John records it simply.  But we can only imagine the joy that this man experienced.  Imagine never having seen colors, or the sun, or light reflecting on water, or the blue of the sky.  And suddenly having sight.  I read on the news a story some time ago of two brothers who were able to see colors for the first time.  And the story said that they cried.  I can’t imagine the wonder that this man felt.  

Baptism is the symbolic act of washing.  But it is a symbol of spiritual washing,  not the removal of dirt from the body.  But the act of God in providing a clean conscience. 1 Peter 3:21 says “Corresponding to that, baptism now saves you–not the removal of dirt from the flesh, but an appeal to God for a good conscience–through the resurrection of Jesus Christ.”  How do we get a clean conscience?  By the removal of our guilt, the forgiveness of our sins. That is the significance of washing.  

Listen, that is why repentance is the twin sister of faith. You are  saved not only by faith, but faith and repentance.  One cannot be saved without repentance.  We must be made clean to be holy, and we must be holy to be accepted by God.  Paul said in 1Cor. 6:9-11 “Or do you not know that the unrighteous will not inherit the kingdom of God? Do not be deceived; neither fornicators, nor idolaters, nor adulterers, nor effeminate, nor homosexuals, nor thieves, nor the covetous, nor drunkards, nor revilers, nor swindlers, will inherit the kingdom of God. Such were some of you; but you were washed, but you were sanctified, but you were justified in the name of the Lord Jesus Christ and in the Spirit of our God.”  To be washed indicates to receive forgiveness for your sins, to be sanctified is to be holy, that is separated from your sins, and to be justified is to be declared not guilty,  freed from the penalty of your sin.  That is the whole of salvation. And that happens through faith and repentance.  To be washed is necessary.  If you continue in your sins, then regardless of what you say you believe, you are still in your sins.  To be a true disciple, Jesus said in chapter 8, you are to continue in God’s word.  That is the distinction between those who claim to be Christians and those who show themselves to be disciples.  One continues in their sin, and one continues in God’ word through obedience.

Well, this man came back seeing. He had been walking in the dark, now he was walking in the light. He came back different than when he left.  And as we will see next week, he immediately was kicked out of the temple, he immediately suffered persecution for his faith.  Once again showing that suffering is a part of the life of faith, and not as many would teach, that faith exempts us from suffering.  God does allow suffering, but so that we might show forth the glory of God through it.  Perhaps you are afraid that if you choose to obey Christ you will suffer for your faith.  That is entirely possible. God may want to rub some dirt in your eyes so that you might show forth the glory of God.  And that might be uncomfortable, even painful.  The work of God is sometimes offensive.  People tend to get mad when you tell them that all men are sinners, and therefore they are a sinner.  The Jews tried to kill Jesus for that, and eventually they succeeded.  But even then, God used their evil for good.  God brought about salvation for the world through the suffering of our Savior.  

But I hope that today’s message has illustrated for you that Jesus suffered so that we might have life, and have it more abundantly.  That we might turn from darkness and walk in the light.  And then that our life should reflect the light of Christ to a dark and dying world.  This is the work we have been called to do.  I pray that you are going to be about the business of the kingdom of God this week.  The day is coming when no man can work.  This dark world seems to get darker by the hour.  Let us work while it is still day to bring glory to God through our lives. 

Perhaps you are here today and you recognize that you are missing something.  You have an intellectual basis or emotional basis for your faith, but you realize that you are still very much attached to this world, and have never let go of the things of this world. I would encourage you today to simply call out to the Lord in faith and repentance, and ask Him to wash you and make you a new creation.  Jesus said that he who comes to Me I will in no way cast out.  Today while it is still day, come to Jesus, call upon Him to save you, and He will anoint the eyes of your heart, that you might see and that you might walk in the light, even as Jesus is the light of the world.

Well today’s message is going to be a little bit different than usual.  I’m not going to expound the text, line by line, word by word as I would typically do. But today I want to focus on just a few points that Jesus makes at the end of this dialogue that we have been looking at for several weeks and try to make an application for us here this morning.

Almost every week that we have been studying John, I have quoted the same verse of scripture at some point during my message.  Any guesses which verse that would be?  Let’s assume that is a rhetorical question.  The verse of scripture I quote almost every week is from John 4:24  “God is spirit, and those who worship Him must worship in spirit and truth.”

Now I have done that deliberately.  Most of the signage for our church says “Worship on the beach!” And so I would hope that is why you are here this morning.  To worship God. I hope that is your purpose. But we are not the only people who are worshipping this morning.  There are churches all over this county that claim to be worshipping God. There are seemingly a lot of different options out there for people who want to worship God.

However, I want to remind you that at the very beginning of the Bible, God makes it clear that He is not obligated to accept our worship, unless we worship Him as He desires.  As He designed it.  In Genesis 4, Cain and Abel come to present their offerings to the Lord.  You know the story.  Cain brought the fruit of his labor, the best of his crops, and Abel brought the firstlings of his flock and their fat portions.  That means that he brought animal sacrifices, blood sacrifices. And it says that the LORD had regard for Abel and for his offering; but for Cain and for his offering He had no regard.

And that shows that God did not accept Cain’s worship, but He accepted Abel’s worship.  That was God’s prerogative, wasn’t it?  But what was Cain’s response?  He became angry, and in his anger he sinned and murdered his brother.  

Now we find a very similar situation presented here in this passage today.  The Jews were very religious, they had a system of worship by which they believed they could please God, by which they thought they could  become acceptable to God, and yet Jesus said it did not please God.  In fact He says that they are still in their sins, and so they become angry, and end up plotting to murder Christ, and finally succeed in murdering Him 6 months later. 

The question then is how are we to worship God?  How do you know that He accepts your worship?  How does your worship make you acceptable to God? I’ve been speaking about this for weeks now to some degree or another. I would assume that most of us consider ourselves Christians.  But if I were to take a survey of 100 Christians about what they base their faith on, I would not be surprised to find that there would be dozens of different answers.  

There are millions of professing Christians around this country that are attempting to worship God this morning.  You happen to be here.  But how do you know what is true?  How do you know what is acceptable worship and what is not?  Why should you believe what I am telling you?  Does it really matter how or where you worship?  Does it really matter if you go to church or which church? Does the content of the worship service really matter?  Won’t God just accept you if you are sincere?  Does God really care how you worship Him?

Well, I would say that most of those questions can be answered by Jesus’s statement which I quoted from a moment ago, “God is Spirit, and those that worship Him must worship Him in spirit and in truth.” Note that He says you MUST worship Him in spirit and in truth.  It’s not optional, it’s not conditional.  He is stating the requirements for acceptable worship. Yet I must say I don’t think most professing Christians really believe that.  I think they have this idea that God is going to accept their worship however they may present it.  And yet I would point out again that illustration of Cain and Abel.  I believe that this was placed at the beginning of the scriptures for a reason,  that we might recognize that God has certain standards and requirements for worship.  And if God does not accept your worship, then I am afraid I have to tell you some bad news.  It’s the same news that Jesus told the Jews in this passage three different times.  Jesus said, “You will seek Me, but you will not find Me, and so as a consequence you will die in your sins.” And to add insult to injury, over and over again, particularly in vs.47 and again in vs.55, Jesus said you don’t know God.  In spite of their worship, they didn’t know God, and as a result they would die in their sins.

Now why would Jesus say something so dreadful to these very religious people, who were in the temple worshipping God at that very moment?  In fact, they had been there for a week long religious festival, night and day worshipping God.  And yet Jesus has the audacity to tell them that they are going to die in their sins.  That their worship was useless. Why would He say such a harsh thing as that?  These people were sincere.  They were worshipping God.  They were in church for a week.  Doesn’t that count?

I’ll tell you why Jesus said that.  First He said it because He loved them.  If He didn’t love them, He wouldn’t warn them of their impending doom, would He?  But because He loved them, He told them they were still in their sins. We hear all the time, love the sinner, hate the sin. But the Bible teaches that if you love the sinner, you will expose their sin.   People get offended though when you tell them that they are a sinner.  Just like Cain, the natural man gets angry at the idea he is a sinner.  But God’s desire is to save you from the condemnation of sin, and He cannot do that unless you first recognize that you are a sinner.  

But there is another reason that Jesus said that they were going to die in their sins.  And that is because they did not know the truth. Jesus said in vs 32, “you will know the truth, and the truth will make you free.” Some people think that freedom means that they can come to God any way they want, just as they are. But that is not what Jesus is teaching.  The freedom Jesus is speaking of is freedom from their sins. In other words, if they knew the truth, it would set them free from the penalty and enslavement of their sins. But these Jews didn’t accept the truth, because it did not fit into their paradigm of religion.  So Jesus said in vs.40, “But as it is, you are seeking to kill Me, a man who has told you the truth, which I heard from God; this Abraham did not do.”  So just like Cain, they plot to murder Jesus, because they didn’t like the fact that God had rejected their worship.

So verse 32 then where Jesus said “you will know the truth and the truth will make you free” correlates to the quote from chapter 4:24, “God is spirit, and those who worship Him must worship in spirit and truth.”  If you neglect the truth, or reject the truth, or ignore the truth, then your worship of God is in vain.  It doesn’t matter how sincere it is, it doesn’t matter how emotional you may be about it, it doesn’t matter how beautiful you may think the service may be, or how inspiring it may seem to you. If it is not truth, then it is not accepted by God, and as such you are still in your sins.  

Do you understand that folks?  I’m talking to you folks here today right now.  I’m not talking about the Jews 2000 years ago. I’m talking to 21st century Christians right here in this community. I’m telling you by the authority of God’s word that if your worship of God is not according to the truth, then your worship is in vain and you will die in your sins.

So what is truth? That’s the logical next question, isn’t it?  Well, Jesus has the answer to that question as well.  First of all, right in vs 31 He says that His words are truth: “If you continue in My word, then you are truly disciples of Mine; and you will know the truth, and the truth will make you free.”  Back in vs.14 at the beginning of this dialogue, He says, “My testimony is true.”  In John 17:17, Jesus says, “Your word is truth.”  And note another tremendous verse, which connects truth and the spirit together as we saw earlier that both are required. In John 6:63 Jesus says “It is the Spirit who gives life; the flesh profits nothing; the words that I have spoken to you are spirit and are life.”

So then we know the truth by the word of God.  And the word of God is spirit and truth which gives life. So if we are going to do what Jesus said, and worship God in spirit and in truth, then we must worship according to the word of God, which is the gospel of Christ. So God reveals how we must worship Him in His word.  

There is an important principle of hermeneutics, (hermeneutics means the interpretation of the Bible) and it’s called the principle of first mention.  How that works is that you find the first time a word or phrase is used, and that becomes a template for how you are to understand that usage throughout the Bible. And the first time worship is mentioned is found is in Genesis 22.  Abraham has been told by God to offer up his son Isaac on the altar.  To sacrifice his son.  And so He gets up early in the morning, and his servants and Isaac go to the mountain that God has appointed. And seeing the mountain in the distance, Abraham says to his servants, “Stay here with the donkey, and I and the lad will go over there; and we will worship and return to you.”

Can you imagine that?  God told him to sacrifice his son, he has a knife to slit his son’s throat, he has the wood to make the fire, and his plan is to sacrifice his son in order to obey God.  And Abraham calls that worship.  Now that’s heavy. Think about that for a moment. And compare that definition of worship to most concepts of modern worship today.  There is no comparison.  There is no correlation.  Listening to a band play music and clapping your hands does not quite equate to sacrificing one’s own son whom you love with all your heart.  There is no comparison.  

Actually there is a comparison by contrast.  And that is in Genesis 22 as well. As Abraham bound his son on the altar and raised the knife to kill his son, God provided a ram caught in a thicket at the last moment. God pointed out the ram which was provided to be Isaac’s substitute.  And that was a picture of the sinless substitute that God would provide for the sin of the world so that sinners condemned to death might be made acceptable to God. So that their sins might be taken away. 

I believe that event is what Jesus is referring to in vs.56.  Jesus said, ”Your father Abraham rejoiced to see My day, and he saw it and was glad.”  I think that Abraham was given the insight at that moment, that there would come the Lamb of God who would die in our place, as our substitute, so that we might be saved from the wrath of God against sin.  Abraham saw Christ’s day prefigured in the ram that he slew and laid on the altar.  And Abraham rejoiced, not only because Isaac was spared, but also because he understood the fulfillment of the prophecy given before Isaac was born, which was that through his seed would come One from whom the whole world would be blessed.

So before you can begin to worship in spirit and in truth, your sins have to be dealt with.  And God has provided a substitute to pay the penalty of death that we all deserve because all have sinned, and none of us are righteous.  So that is the first step in worshipping God.  Believing who Jesus is, and what He came to do, and accepting His sacrifice for your sins, that you may be counted as righteous through Jesus Christ.  

Listen, that is the basis for our salvation.  We cannot come to God without a sacrifice. Because the penalty that God requires for sin is death.  Romans 3:23 says “the wages of sin is death but the gift of God is eternal life through Jesus Christ our Lord.”  There are two essential elements in obtaining that salvation which Christ paid for.  Two essential elements; faith and repentance.  Faith is believing who Jesus is; the Lamb of God who takes away the sins of the world, and repentance is confessing and turning from your sins and asking God for forgiveness. 

 In the book of Acts, we see that the apostles taught that faith and repentance were necessary, Acts 20:21says they were “solemnly testifying to both Jews and Greeks of repentance toward God and faith in our Lord Jesus Christ.” Paul instructs Timothy in 2 Timothy 2:25  “with gentleness correcting those who are in opposition, if perhaps God may grant them repentance leading to the knowledge of the truth.”  Jesus and the disciples went about preaching repentance and the necessity to believe in Christ. So repentance and faith are the twin pillars of our faith.

Now I will tell you what most modern worshippers get wrong.  They emphasize faith, but not repentance.  They say believe in God, but they don’t say repent of your sins.  I would suggest that the word sin is an anathema in most churches today. They don’t want to offend anyone. Instead, sin is accepted, it’s even condoned in many churches.  But I will say this, without repentance from sin, there can be no salvation.  And without the appropriation of Christ’s sacrifice to cover your sin, there can be no worship. There can be no fellowship with God.  There can be no acceptance from God.  

That’s why Jesus kept emphasizing to those Jewish religious leaders that they would die in their sins, because they would not accept the One who came to pay the penalty of their sin.  Now how do you know what is sin?  It must be found in God’s word.  God’s word defines sin.  God’s law defines sin. Not society, not the culture, not some religious figurehead.  No one can define sin but God. Sin is anything that does not conform to the nature of God.  And God has written His word that we might know sin, that sin would become even more sinful. 

Yet how many churches today are trying to accommodate society’s definitions of lifestyle, of behavior?  In their efforts to appeal to the world, they accept the world’s definitions of marriage, for instance, when it is in opposition to God’s definitions in His word.  I have to say that if they are changing God’s definition of sin then they are not worshipping God in spirit and in truth.  They are worshipping God in vain. They are still in their sins.

Notice how Jesus keeps refocusing on this aspect of God’s word is truth, and that His words are God’s words.  John 8:43-47,  “Why do you not understand what I am saying? It is because you cannot hear My word.  You are of your father the devil, and you want to do the desires of your father. He was a murderer from the beginning, and does not stand in the truth because there is no truth in him. Whenever he speaks a lie, he speaks from his own nature, for he is a liar and the father of lies. But because I speak the truth, you do not believe Me. Which one of you convicts Me of sin? If I speak truth, why do you not believe Me? He who is of God hears the words of God; for this reason you do not hear them, because you are not of God.”

So the bottom line is that He says, you don’t believe my word because you are from your father the devil who is the father of lies.  So instead of believing my word, you believe a lie. Since you are not of God, you don’t accept My word.  I would suggest this is evident in Christianity today; that those that do not believe God’s word is the truth, have no use for God’s word.  That is why many churches today rarely refer to the word of God.  They rarely preach the word.  They rarely teach the word.  Instead they sing some songs, watch a couple of videos, maybe watch a skit, and then the pastor ends up telling a couple of funny stories at the end, and everyone goes home feeling vaguely entertained and self righteous.  

So I will summarize so far; if the church does not preach faith and repentance, then they are not worshipping God in truth.  And if the church does not preach the word, then they are not of the truth.  I don’t care how entertaining it is. They have forsaken the truth, and as such are apostate.

Here is what the religious apostates believe: that God is love, and that sin is ok. That God accepts them in their sin. And so they hate anyone who preaches against sin.  This is the difference between true religion and false religion.  False religion does not deal with sin and claims all that is necessary is a relationship with God, and true religion recognizes that sin must be dealt with in order to have fellowship with God.

I want to point out another statement Jesus made in vs.50 “But I do not seek My glory; there is One who seeks and judges.”  This is another way that they should have recognized that Jesus was speaking the truth.  He did not seek His own glory, but He sought to glorify the Father in all that He did.  

And I would suggest that this is a way that Christians can discern those who speak or teach the truth.  If a church or a worship service is geared so that it brings glory to the people who are conducting it, then you need to be suspect of whether or not they are of the truth.  I’m going to be very candid with you for a moment.  I don’t do this to bring glory to myself.  I don’t do this for fame.  I don’t do this to bring some sort of honor to myself.  To be frank, I’m often humiliated as a pastor.  But I think that is the method God employs to able to use me. 

There was a time in my life when I had a certain degree of fame when I was in the antique business. I was on a national television show about antiques for a few years as an appraiser.  And I received  a lot of recognition from people in my field at that time in my life.  I thought that God could use me from that platform and from my success to bring people to the Lord. But God had to take me down a few pegs in my pride in order to be able to use me for His glory and not my own.  So I didn’t chose this ministry because I thought it would make me popular or well liked.  If anything, the more people listen to me, the more enemies I seem to make.  

But I will say that I am in good company.  Jesus said in John 15:18 “If the world hates you, you know that it has hated Me before it hated you.”  And I believe that is because I try to preach the truth of God’s word.  We obviously don’t have a whole lot else to offer you folks here.  I don’t tell jokes very well.  We don’t have a cool band.  We don’t have skits or interpretive dancing.  But what we do is preach the truth of God’s word without apology and as the central focus of our worship.  And I believe that the word of God is truth, and that only the truth will set you free. Some people are offended by that.  And as a result they get mad when I preach on sin, and the need for repentance.  But I would also hope that there are going to be some that will believe, and will respond to the truth, and will commit to this church.

Sometimes I find myself praying the prayer of Elijah as he contended with the priests of Baal in 1Kings 18:36.  He prayed, ““O LORD, the God of Abraham, Isaac and Israel, today let it be known that You are God in Israel and that I am Your servant and I have done all these things at Your word. Answer me, O Lord, answer me, that this people may know that You, O LORD, are God, and that You have turned their heart back again.”  I pray that God will show that I have done these things according to HIs word.  And that God will turn the hearts of His people back again.

Well, I warned you that I was going to go on a bit of a tangent today.  And so I’m going to wrap this up with one last point.  And that is the principle found in vs.51, “Truly, truly, I say to you, if anyone keeps My word he will never see death.” Death is the universal consequence of sin.  But for those who believe in Christ’s word, and keep His word, they will not see that consequence of death. Their body will die, but their spirit will live forever with Christ.

So you want to worship Him in spirit and in truth?  Then you will keep His word.  Jesus emphasizes this over and over again.  This key principle is found in vs.31, “If you continue in My word, then you are truly disciples of Mine; and you will know the truth, and the truth will make you free.”

Listen,1 Samuel 15:22 says, “to obey is better than sacrifice and to heed than the fat of rams.”   To obey is better than coming with songs and hymns. Isaiah 29:13 says, “Then the Lord said,’Because this people draw near with their words And honor Me with their lip service, But they remove their hearts far from Me, And their reverence for Me consists of tradition learned by rote.”  And because of that false worship, God says He will turn away from them. God wants obedience from the heart.  To obey is to love the Lord. Jesus said in John 14:15  “If you love Me, you will keep My commandments.”

Notice that phrase, “their reverence consists of tradition learned by rote.” Jesus is speaking of rituals and ceremonies that may have their origin in worship, but they have become external rituals that have not affected their hearts. Just watch a Catholic or Episcopal service and I think that you will definitely see the correlation to what Jesus is speaking of. 

Now, I don’t have a lot of time to show you every reference this morning, but over and over again Jesus says “continue in my word”, or “keep my word,”  or “keep my commandments.”  In fact, as an example to us,  Jesus Himself keeps the word.  That was the measure of His truthfulness that the Jews should have recognized.  He says in vs55 “and you have not come to know Him, but I know Him; and if I say that I do not know Him, I will be a liar like you, but I do know Him and keep His word.”  

And I would suggest that this is the way we know that someone knows the Lord as well.  They keep the word of God.  If they don’t keep the word of God, then they don’t know God.  1John 2:3, 5  “By this we know that we have come to know Him, if we keep His commandments.” … 5 “but whoever keeps His word, in him the love of God has truly been perfected. By this we know that we are in Him.” 

That’s the reality of true worship.  It’s sacrificing your prerogatives, your rights, your purposes, to obey the word of God.  It’s putting Christ first in your life.  True worship requires that you bring to God the offering of yourself.  Romans 12:1-2 says, “Therefore I urge you, brethren, by the mercies of God, to present your bodies a living and holy sacrifice, acceptable to God, which is your spiritual service of worship.  And do not be conformed to this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your mind, so that you may prove what the will of God is, that which is good and acceptable and perfect.”  

That’s all I have for you this morning.  Worship the Lord in spirit and in truth.  Nothing else counts.  Anything less than the truth is a lie.  God desires truth in the innermost being.  And we do that by being conformed to God’s word.  Simply lay the template of the gospel over your life, and follow the commands of God as He laid them out in His word.  It starts with a sacrifice, Jesus substitionary death on the cross, and it ends with another sacrifice, presenting your body as a living and holy sacrifice.  Acceptable to God. That is your spiritual service of worship. That is how we are made free.  Let us pray.

There are many voices calling out for attention in the church today.  And there are perhaps as many messages as there are voices.  How are we to know which are true, and which are trustworthy?  Many of them sound convincing.  Many of them claim to be based on scripture. And yet many messages are at odds with one another.  So they cannot all be true.  If some are true, then others have to be false.  The great difficulty comes in discerning which are true and which are false.

I believe that the Bible teaches us that the way to know the truth is by the leading of the Holy Spirit. When I got right with God 37 years ago in California, that was the primary thing I asked of the Lord, that I would know the truth.  And later on that evening, as I read the book of John, God showed me three passages which I believe indicated that the Holy Spirit was the source of truth, and the means by which I could know the truth.  The apostle John records Jesus as introducing the Holy Spirit specifically as the Spirit of Truth.  Listen to what Jesus says in John 14:16-17  “I will ask the Father, and He will give you another Helper, that He may be with you forever;  that is the Spirit of truth, whom the world cannot receive, because it does not see Him or know Him, but you know Him because He abides with you and will be in you.”

And Jesus reiterates that in the next two chapters.  John 15:26, “When the Helper comes, whom I will send to you from the Father, that is the Spirit of truth who proceeds from the Father, He will testify about Me.”  The third is in John 16:13  “But when He, the Spirit of truth, comes, He will guide you into all the truth; for He will not speak on His own initiative, but whatever He hears, He will speak; and He will disclose to you what is to come.”

So three times Jesus gives us this phrase, the Spirit of Truth, as both a title and a description of the ministry of the Holy Spirit. So when Jesus declares this three times, we can be certain that it is an essential doctrine, and that it’s validity is without question.

Knowing that principle then helps us to understand the nature and purpose of the Holy Spirit. One of the greatest misunderstandings in Christianity today is that of the ministry of the Holy Spirit. Just taking these three verses at face value, then we must recognize that the primary ministry of the Holy Spirit is to reveal to us the truth.  So many people seem to miss that altogether.  They think that the purpose of the Holy Spirit is to make us feel  something, ie, the presence of God, or to give us some emotional response or ecstatic experience.  But that simply is not taught in the Bible.  

Paul makes it clear in 1Cor. 2:11-14 that we have been given the Spirit so that we might know the things of God, through the word of God.  He says, “For who among men knows the thoughts of a man except the spirit of the man which is in him? Even so the thoughts of God no one knows except the Spirit of God. Now we have received, not the spirit of the world, but the Spirit who is from God, so that we may know the things freely given to us by God,  which things we also speak, not in words taught by human wisdom, but in those taught by the Spirit, combining spiritual thoughts with spiritual words. But a natural man does not accept the things of the Spirit of God, for they are foolishness to him; and he cannot understand them, because they are spiritually appraised.”   So we have to have the Spirit of God to understand the things of God, particularly the word of God, which of course was inspired by the Holy Spirit.

It’s also interesting that the Holy Spirit is spoken of not only as the Spirit of Truth but as the Spirit of Christ.  Look at Romans 8:9  “However, you are not in the flesh but in the Spirit, if indeed the Spirit of God dwells in you. But if anyone does not have the Spirit of Christ, he does not belong to Him.”  In fact, Peter goes even further stating in 1 Peter 1:11 that the Spirit of Christ was working in the Old Testament prophets when they wrote the scriptures.

So in the Trinity, all three are one in agreement, in unity, and are the same in nature, but different only in administration.  So Jesus is the exact representation of the Father in flesh, speaking the words of the Father and doing the deeds of the Father, and the Holy Spirit is the exact representation of the Son in the Spirit, enabling us to do the deeds of Christ and to know the words of Christ, which is how we come to know God.

Now this may seem like a lengthy introduction and unrelated to the passage before us, but I believe that it is actually very pertinent to understanding today’s text as I hope to show you in due time.  Because what is at stake here is the authority and deity of Jesus Christ.  How could the Jews know for sure that what He was teaching was true?  Was His message trustworthy?  Was He claiming to be God, and was that a true teaching?

Now the Gospel of John is different from the synoptic gospels, Matthew, Mark, and Luke. Even more specifically than the others, John wants to show that Jesus is the Son of God, the very God come in the flesh. In the first place, rather than starting his gospel with the birth of Christ as the other writers do, John opens his gospel with Jesus in heaven, an eternity past before His physical birth. He says, ”In the beginning was the Word and the Word was with God and the Word was God.” John does not present miracles in his gospel, he has signs. That is, his miracles are intended to teach spiritual truth. He is very strategic in deciding which signs to include, and those which he does are used to point to Jesus’ divinity.  Furthermore, the book of John is characterized by the upper room discourse, in chapters 13 through 16, and then the great high priestly prayer, in chapter 17. 

But one of the primary things that characterizes the Gospel of John as different is the claim of divinity that Jesus Christ makes for Himself. They are unique in the sense that they are self-proclaimed. And that was a problem for the Jews. It was a problem because the law specified that truth cannot be established on the basis of a single testimony, but that only by the testimony of two or three witnesses may a matter be established. 

The claims of Christ are extraordinary to say the least.  The well known prophets of other religions such as Mohammed or Buddha or Confucius did not claim to be God. But Christ claimed to be God.  For example, Jesus has proclaimed in the temple, with thousands of people in attendance at the Feast of Tabernacles, three great claims equated with the pre-existent God of the Israelites.  The first statement was, “If anyone is thirsty, let him come to Me and drink. He who believes in Me, as the Scripture said, ‘From his innermost being will flow rivers of living water.”   

Now in that claim, Jesus is speaking at the exact moment when the priests poured water into basins which spilled down upon the altar, signifying the water which came from the rock in the wilderness when Moses struck it.  John tells us in the next verse that Jesus was speaking of the Holy Spirit who had not yet been given to those who believed.  Paul said in 1Cor. 10:4 that “all drank the same spiritual drink, for they were drinking from a spiritual rock which followed them; and the rock was Christ.”  So the rock was Christ, and the water is a picture of the Holy Spirit which springs from Christ, welling up inside of the believer.  This picture of living water flowing from our innermost being is representative of the life of Christ, the power of Christ, living in us, enabling us to do the works of Christ and to understand the truth of God.

That was the reason that in the first instance of water coming from the rock, Moses was told to strike the rock, signifying that God would smite Jesus on the cross, and by His sacrifice making us holy so we are able to receive the Holy Spirit.  But 40 years later in the second occurrence of Moses smiting the rock for water he was disobedient.  Because God does not strike Jesus again and again.  He was the sacrifice for sin once on the cross, and now He ever lives to make intercession for us.  Hence, the second time Moses needed only to speak, to ask for God to give water, signifying that we have a mediator, great high priest in heaven, Jesus who is able to make intercession for us.  

So in the first statement in effect Jesus is saying that He was the Rock in the wilderness, from which the Israelites were able to drink.  And in the second statement, Jesus cries out during another ritual when the priests lit the great candelabras which lit up the courtyard and the temple during the evening, saying, “I am the light of the world, he who follows Me will not walk in the darkness, but will have the Light of life.”

In this second statement, Jesus indicates that He is the great “I Am”, the name God gave to Moses at the burning bush.  And then thirdly, He compares Himself to the pillar of fire that led and protected the Israelites as they wandered in the wilderness.  That was the significance of the ceremony during the Feast which was the context for Jesus’ proclamation.  It celebrated the light that shone above the tabernacle over the camp of the Israelites and protected them as they traveled.  And at just the moment when the priests lit the candelabras, Jesus cried out in the temple, “I am the light of the world, he who follows Me will not walk in darkness, but will have the Light of life.”

So Jesus proclaims with great boldness who He is, and what His purpose is, and I’m sure the full import of what He said was not lost on His hearers, especially the Pharisees.  And yet their response was not to accept the truth of what He was saying, but to focus on a technicality.  They say, “You’re bearing record of yourself. Your record therefore is not true. “  What they are really saying is, “You’re not following the teaching of the law.”

In fact, Jesus Himself had stated that principle of the law, back in chapter 5 verse 31 Jesus said, “If I bear witness of myself, my witness is not true.” So you would think that perhaps the Pharisees have a point in their accusation. But Jesus answers them in a way that shows that while in His flesh He has submitted Himself to the Law, but in His divinity He is outside of the Law, because He is the author of the Law.

So to establish that He is outside the law, first of all He says, “Even if I testify about Myself, My testimony is true, for I know where I came from and where I am going; but you do not know where I come from or where I am going.”  In other words, men are creatures of the present.  We cannot revisit the past, nor can we know the future.  That is the province of God alone.  Therefore the testimony of men is unreliable, but what Christ knew in Himself embraced the two eternities, the eternity of the past and the eternity of the future. And therefore, He knows that the things that He says are true.

Secondly He says that they may judge according to appearance or human logic.  But He does not judge by appearances or human standards. Vs.15, “You judge according to the flesh; I am not judging anyone.”  That is exactly what Jesus said in John 3:17, “For God did not send the Son into the world to judge the world, but that the world might be saved through Him.”  

But the world would in fact one day be judged by Him, because they rejected Him.  So vs 18 says,  “He who believes in Him is not judged; he who does not believe has been judged already, because he has not believed in the name of the only begotten Son of God.”  The judgment of sin was already in place in the world.  It is only removed by Christ.  So to reject Christ is to reject forgiveness of that judgment, and thus the judgment remains upon him.  But Christ came the first time to save the world, not to judge it.  Judgment came upon the world way back in the Garden of Eden with the first Adam.  Salvation from judgment comes with the second Adam.

Not only can we say that Christ was the second Adam, but there is a sense in which Christ was the second Noah as well.  Heb.11:7 says “By faith Noah, being warned by God about things not yet seen, in reverence prepared an ark for the salvation of his household, by which he condemned the world, and became an heir of the righteousness which is according to faith.”  Again, the condemnation of the world had already been established. The ark represented salvation for the world, but they rejected it.  The Bible says that Noah preached 120 years, and yet we have no record of his message.  His message was the living testimony of his life, and the coming destruction was foretold by the building of the ark.  So also Christ is patient, not willing for any to perish, and the gospel has been preached for 2000 years so that they who reject it are without excuse, condemning themselves to destruction.

The third argument Jesus presents to them is to say that divine testimony can only be witnessed to by a divine being.  Note vs.16 “But even if I do judge, My judgment is true; for I am not alone in it, but I and the Father who sent Me. Even in your law it has been written that the testimony of two men is true. I am He who testifies about Myself, and the Father who sent Me testifies about Me.”  So Jesus says that God the Father also testifies concerning Him. Matt.3;17 says that at the baptism of Jesus, God spoke from heaven saying, “This is My beloved Son in whom I am well pleased.”  Only divinity can attest to the truth of divinity.  No man was there in the beginning with God, only God was in the beginning with God.  So if we are going to know the truth about God, then God must reveal it Himself.  Finite man cannot know it, therefore he cannot attest to God’s truthfulness. 

So Jesus is saying then that God can testify about Himself, otherwise we could not come to know God.  God has to reveal knowledge of Him if we are to know Him.  Otherwise we worship Him in ignorance.  Otherwise we are left to guess how to please God.  We have to imagine what God is like or compose a picture of Him based on earthly evidence such as creation.  We can in fact learn that God must exist from observing nature, and we can ascertain certain eternal characteristics about God through nature, but we cannot know God fully as He wants to be known simply through nature.  He must reveal Himself, He must testify of Himself if we are to know Him.  And God has testified about Christ, and Christ has testified about God.  Jesus was the exact representation of God, according to Hebrews 1:3.  

One of the amazing things this passage illustrates is that although these men claimed to know God, they really did not know Him, because they did not recognize the truth about Jesus. I find this is the problem with many people today. They say they know God, but the god they believe in is a god of their own imagination. They are merely projecting an idea about God that is a fantasy of their own imagination. Consequently they do not know God at all. Neither do they worship God; they are worshiping a product of their imagination. As James said, “you say you believe in God, so what? The devil’s also believe and tremble.”  You are not saved by believing in the existence of God.  You are saved by worshipping God in the truth.

Dr. Martyn Lloyd-Jones had this to say about such people: “Their god is something which they created themselves, a being who is always prepared to oblige and excuse them. They do not worship Him with awe and respect, indeed they do not worship Him at all. They reveal that their so-called god is no god at all in their speech. For they are forever saying that “they simply cannot believe that God will punish the unrepentant sinner to all eternity, and this and that.” They cannot believe that God will do so, therefore, they draw the conclusion that God does not and will not. In other words, God does what they believe he ought to do or not do. What a false and blasphemous conception of God! How utterly untrue and unworthy! Such is the new paganism of today.” That was written about 60 years ago.  How much more true it is today.

So once again, the Pharisees don’t want to acknowledge the truth of what Jesus is saying. Instead they try a personal attack to disparage His credibility.  Jesus is obviously speaking of His heavenly Father, but they try to disparage His legitimacy by bringing up the rumor of His illegitimate birth.  They are insinuating that His father in the flesh, Joseph, who was actually His step father, was not his legitimate birth father, and so then Jesus was born out of wedlock. 

Vs. 19 So they were saying to Him, “Where is Your Father?” Jesus answered, “You know neither Me nor My Father; if you knew Me, you would know My Father also.”  Now you might look at that at first and think, well now, that’s an incomplete answer, He hasn’t said where is His Father. He hasn’t answered their question. But  He’s answered the more fundamental question. He said you don’t know Me because you don’t know my Father. If I produced my Father you wouldn’t even know him. If you had known Me, you would have known the Father. One knows the Father only as he knows the Son. There is no other way to the Father, except through the Son. The God of the Scriptures is only known through the Son. Over and over again the Bible teaches that. The Lord Jesus later on will say, after Phillip asks him, “Lord, show us the Father.” He will turn to Phillip and say, “Phillip, have I been so long time with you, and yet you have not known Me? He that has seen Me has seen the Father. How then do you say, show us the Father.” And then later on he will say, “I am the way, the truth, and the life. No man comes to the Father except through Me.” It’s impossible to know God except through the Son.

Now John concludes this section by saying in vs.20,  “These words He spoke in the treasury, as He taught in the temple; and no one seized Him, because His hour had not yet come.”  And I can’t help but think that this is the bookend of a single thread of teaching that began back in chapter 7 vs. 8  where Jesus said to His brothers, ”Go up to the feast yourselves; I do not go up to this feast because My time has not yet fully come.”  Now in chapter 8vs.20 we see that even though Jesus said all these things in the temple, in the very headquarters of those who sought to kill Him, no one laid a hand on Him because His hour had not come.  His hour speaking of course, of the hour in which He would lay down His life for the sins of the world.

And I think if you look at this section in total you will see that the theme of Jesus being sent from God, being in unity with God, presenting the truth to the world and then going back to God is consistent throughout the whole section. Implicit in this passage is the principle that God exists out of time, and Jesus being One with God, existed in eternity past, but came into time present, in order to bring the truth of salvation to the world.  Those that believe in Him, He promises to give them life, to give them the deposit of their inheritance, the Holy Spirit, and to give them all the blessings of God.  But those that reject Him remain in darkness, and as such will ensure their own destruction as they remained condemned by that rejection.  

This principle of faith in Christ revealing the  truth of God was stated in chapter  7 vs. 17 “If anyone is willing to do His will, he will know of the teaching, whether it is of God or whether I speak from Myself.”  This is the principle that belief in Christ is self validating, when you submit your will to God, then God will reveal His will to you.  You will know the truth, when you submit to the truth that has been revealed to you. Repentance and faith leads to confirmation of the truth.

Those who claim a superficial form of Christianity would rather skip over texts like the one we have in front of us today.  Instead they would rather find a text that focuses on some benefit to us, like the power to heal, or the power to perform miracles. Let’s find something that assures us of our specialness.  Something dramatic, exciting.  The attention of  many in the church today is firmly fixed on what they suppose to be the dramatic manifestations of the Holy Spirit.  We don’t want to know God, we want to experience Him.

But if we are going to worship the Lord in Spirit and in truth, then we need to make sure that our worship is based in sound doctrine, and that our doctrine comes from the facts of the gospel which were written for our instruction.  Jesus has much to say here about who He is, and the ministry of the Holy Spirit.  So it behooves us to study this passage thoroughly, that we might fully know the truth of God, so that we might worship Him in Spirit and in truth, and not be led astray by a gospel which is not according to Christ, but manipulated by self serving individuals who wish to twist the gospel to serve themselves rather than serving the Lord.

As I said earlier, to judge according to appearances means to judge according to human experience.  Human experience is the fail point of much modern Christianity today.  Unfortunately doctrine has taken a secondary place to experience.  So then, what we feel, what we think, the way we determine truth, is dependent upon our human experience, our human judgment.  And from our experience, or human reasoning, we then interpret scripture or even reject scripture and  determine for ourselves what is worship or determine according to our dictates what God is like.  But that is not the pattern of the gospel and that is not what Jesus taught.  God must disclose Himself to us if we are going to know Him.  And we have to submit ourselves to His truth if we are going to be found acceptable to Him.  So all human experience must be subject to sound doctrine.  And when we believe in Him as He has declared Himself to be, then we must submit ourselves to do His will, and then we will  know the truth of God, because the Holy Spirit will lead us and guide us as we study His word.  That is the pattern of the gospel.  Only then can you know the truth that can truly make you free.