Classic Christianity – Book of John p16 (11-14-18)
Bob George continues teaching from the book of John, beginning at John 5:45. Bob explains how natural man focuses on the things of this world and, as believers, how easy it is to take our focus on the one who is our life, Jesus Christ. Then, when we do focus on Christ, then we miss what Jesus really came to do. Do we come to him only to meet physical needs, such as food and clothing and protection from a storm. Does one trust that he is one who is with you always in every trial and tribulation in this life? What about knowing Him and having life in His name? Have we forgotten why he came? This life is but temporary.
2 Corinthians 4:16-18
16 Therefore we do not lose heart. Though outwardly we are wasting away, yet inwardly we are being renewed day by day. 17 For our light and momentary troubles are achieving for us an eternal glory that far outweighs them all. 18 So we fix our eyes not on what is seen, but on what is unseen, since what is seen is temporary, but what is unseen is eternal.
John 5:45
45 “But do not think I will accuse you before the Father. Your accuser is Moses, on whom your hopes are set. 46 If you believed Moses, you would believe me, for he wrote about me. 47 But since you do not believe what he wrote, how are you going to believe what I say?”
So what do we focus on. Focus is like magnifying glass, it magnifies the problem before our eyes, makes something seem larger than it really is. No problem in life is bigger than God. What we focus on determines the outcome of our life and what we become. If in everything we do or say, we focus on Him, who do we become more like? Yet, in this world, it is so natural to man to focus on religion, tradition, as in the religious leaders saying they focus on the teaching of Moses yet not on Jesus Christ. What you believe affects the totality of your life? How did Jesus respond to the religious leaders who said they put their hopes in Moses. Moses would be their accuser because if they believed Moses they would believe in Jesus Christ, in what he came to do, for Moses wrote about the coming promised Messiah, and Jesus is the Messiah who has now come.
The philosophy of man, how he conducts his life, is predicated on a premise. If your premise is on the fact that in the beginning God created man, the heavens and the earth, and that man was created in His image, how then does that affect your belief and conduct in living. If one rejects that truth, and believes in evolution, what natural patterns of living follow, such as the value of a human life? If one’s premise, his belief system, is off then his findings are off. So, too, if a doctor incorrectly diagnoses someone as having tuberculosis when in fact he does not, he could give him medicine that would kill him. So one does not put their hope in Abraham or Moses, but Jesus Christ, the only hope for man, for what he came to do for man that man could never do for himself.
Bob then transitions to John 6, where Jesus performs some miracles, such as the feeding of 5000 men with five loaves and two fish and the calming of a storm out on the sea of Galilee. Why did he do such miracles? The Father told him to. God knows what is in man and how slow it is for man to believe and so prone to doubt. He did these things so that when he does finish the work God sent him to, to die on a cross, they would come to understand what he did for them. They can know that He is God by the miracles he performed, and just on the basis of the miracles themselves, they would be willing to trust what he says and then understand the purpose of the cross and his resurrection from the dead.
Bob again re-emphasized that our focus should be on Christ. When Jesus says have the people sit down then have the people sit down. When Jesus is in your presence, then there are no circumstances beyond his control. He can feed you and walk on water. God is in the house. God is in the miracle business. When we face trials and tribulations, uncertainty of what to do, turn your eyes on Jesus. What happened when Peter saw Jesus walking on the water and asked if it was him , to have him come to Jesus. So the Father told Jesus to let Peter come. As long as Peter’s eyes were on Jesus, he walked on the water. But when he saw the wind and the waves, taking his eyes off Jesus, he began to sink. Jesus knows our natural tendencies and he is there for us when we do sink to pick us up. Jesus told him, “Why did you doubt. Oh, you of little faith.”
But after this incident with Peter, after Jesus picked him up and they are all safely in the boat and Jesus spoke to the storm and all was calm, they all worshiped him. This may indeed be the first time they had a personal experience with the living God. They worshiped him. They knew him to be God.
All these miracles of Jesus were preparatory work to build men’s trust in who He is so they would listen to Him. He had a message to bring and a work to finish. He came to show us His righteousness, that He is God, and unrighteousness, which is us, so they we may put our trust in Him. He came to die on a cross to take away sin and to be raised again to give His life to man so that man may have His righteousness imputed to him as a gift. All man falls short, all under a death penalty and only Jesus can solve this problem of death and life that man needs. Gospels are preparatory work. God has compassion on people so later when he says something for life and godliness then they will understand. He did not come to do miracles but to die on a cross and rise again to save you spiritually.
2 Corinthians 5:21
God made him who had no sin to be sin for us, so that in him we might become the righteousness of God.
2 Peter 1:3
His divine power has given us everything we need for a godly life through our knowledge of him who called us by his own glory and goodness.
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