John 15:26-16:4 The world will not accept Holy Spirit empowered testimony

John 15:26-27 Jesus now turns to the Holy Spirit, referring to Him as 'helper'. The Holy Spirt will come from the Father, and will testify of Jesus, and the testimony that He gives the disciples, they will in turn give to those to whom they speak. The reason is because Jesus’ disciples have been with Him from the beginning. These are not Johnny-come-lately’s. They have seen His entire ministry from His first call to them to follow Him up to the present time, when they will be witnesses of His passion. So they will testify of all that He said and did during His life, and of His death and resurrection (except they do not understand the resurrection part yet).

John 16:1-4 Jesus repeats His warning. His disciples will be hated on His account, and those who kill them will believe they are serving God by doing so. This is because they do not know the Father. Why is He telling them this now, but never before? They had seen Him in bitter disputes with the priests, scribes, and Pharisees.  Perhaps they would have abandoned Him if they knew the price. He knew that after His departure the Holy Spirit would strengthen them to face the trials and persecution. He did not want them to turn away for the wrong reason. Earlier many had left Him because his teachings were hard. He did nothing to prevent them from leaving for that reason. (John 6:66-67) So the next section deals with the work of the Holy Spirit.

John 15:18-25 They hated Me without cause

John 15:18-25 Jesus now talks about the consequences of being His friends. The world will hate and persecute them. By this He means specifically the world system, that social and political structure that exists in humankind. Abstractly, we might think the world system would be value neutral, and reflect the values and believes of whatever individuals participate in it. But Jesus knows that the whole world lies in the power of the evil one. (I John 5:19) Therefore it actually reflects the evil one's values and beliefs, and therefore it hates Jesus (as will be demonstrated shortly) and consequently it will also hate His friends and followers. The world does this because it does not know the Father. The people in the world do not know the Father, so they persecute His emissaries.

          Jesus now engages is some judgment. The actions of people in the world would not constitute sin if they did things in ignorance. But now that Jesus has come and spoken to them, they are responsible for their response, and consequently their rejection of Him is sin. They have no excuse. The word prophasin suggests that it is pretext or pretense for their sin that has been removed. We say 'ignorance of the law is no excuse', but in God's kingdom, ignorance is an excuse. (See Luke 23:34) But once revelation has occurred that pretext for doing the wrong thing is gone, and missing the mark becomes sin. And this is done to reveal the truth of men's hearts - that they sin not because of circumstance or ignorance, but they sin because they hate the Father and therefore they hate His Son, and therefore they will hate His friends. Jesus quotes Psalm 69:4 to emphasize that the Father sent Him in love, and the world hated Him without any cause. Psalm 69 is the cry of distress, written by David, of a person whose life is threatened by both natural circumstances and adversaries. In some respects it could be considered prophetic of the suffering of Christ, except that verse 5 refers to folly and wrongs of the petitioner. John had previously quote Psalm 69:9, in John 2:17 on the occasion of Jesus’ cleansing of the temple, as something that the disciples remembered. Here Jesus directly quotes a different verse of the same Psalm. Jesus might have been reflecting that in fact the reason they hated Him was because He had confronted religious hypocrisy and exposed as sin the hearts and actions of the religious establishment.

John 15:12-17 This is My commandment, that you love one another

John 15:12-17 Jesus commands His disciples to love each other, and then explains exactly what divine love is. It is the greatest form of love. C.S. Lewis wrote a book on four different types of love. Each has its place. But the greatest form of love is the agape love which is epitomized by what Jesus is about to do - to die for His friends. This sometimes happens in combat, in the armed forces, and sometimes in other situations of extreme duress. I think that some small amount of this type of love was portrayed by Clint Eastwood in the movie Gran Torino.

          Of course, laying down one's life can take many forms besides dying. It can be exhibited in sacrificial living. For example, Mother Teresa cared for the poor in Calcutta, daily tending to their needs, binding up their sores, bringing them food and comfort, in the name of Christ. Most mothers exhibit similar sacrificial love in daily care for their children, laying down their own desires and needs in order to care for their children.

          Another aspect of love is friendship. Jesus here implies that He had previously called His disciples slaves, perhaps doulos, or love-slaves, but now He calls them philon, friends, those He is fond of. We could speculate on the difference between doulos and philon, but fortunately Jesus was very specific about what He meant. There are two aspects in which they are His friends. First, they do what He commands, which means in this case to love each other just as He has loved them. Second, He has revealed to them everything the Father has told Him, so they are not slaves, but participants in God's grand plan. A slave would only be told what he is to do, and not what the overall plan is and how he fits into it. He is now telling them everything. And then Jesus goes on in a Calvinistic statement about choice. They did not choose Him, but He chose them, and for a specific purpose, that they should bear permanent fruit.

          Verse 16 repeats the promise from verse 7 about answers to prayer. Therefore, we can infer that this is another viewpoint on the same core truth. Their love for each other, their obedience to His commandments, can only flow from a relationship in which God's life is flowing through them, which will be exhibited in this case by brotherly love for each other. Outsiders, unbelievers, cannot see what is in peoples' hearts, and may quibble about theology. But as Jesus stated earlier (John 13:35) all men can recognize love, and they will recognize the outflow of God's love in the lives of Jesus' disciples.  And then Jesus repeats His command, as verse 17 repeats verse 12, bookends to this thought.

John 15:1-11 The true vine

John 15:1-11 Jesus now creates another metaphoric self-revelation: "I am the true vine." We need to see the whole picture. Humankind is part of a vine planted in the vineyard of the earth. The true vine is Jesus, and His disciples are branches. The Father is the vintner. He is raising fruit to make wine. He is a good farmer, and tends His crops. The Father's desire is that His vineyard bear much fruit. He plans to make excellent wine. Jesus draws on the parables relating to vineyards in Matthew 20:1-16, and Matthew 21:33-44 and, before them, Isaiah's parable (Isaiah 5:1-2). But here He elaborates on a new application of this metaphor. His disciples are the branches of the vine from which God expects fruit. 

       Jesus gives an explanation of how this fruit comes to be. It comes from abiding in Jesus. The Father prunes the vine to remove unfruitful branches.  The rest of the branches become even more fruitful when the deadwood has been removed. The Father will be glorified when Jesus' disciples bear fruit.

        Jesus concludes this metaphor by tying into a single bundle obedience, love, and joy. Keeping His commandments and abiding in His love are one and the same thing. The metaphor of the vine illustrates this. Moisture and essential nutrients flow through the vine to the branches. Once they are broken off this flow ceases and they die. Just so, we must abide in Jesus to be connected to the source and pathway for the live of the Father. When the tree sap of God's presence flows through us, it produces all of the fruit that God desires, and keeping His commandments becomes a natural lifestyle.

       We might stop before going on to ask why the modern church sees so little of this. We see little love between fellow believers in different denominations, and great church splits give evidence of this lack even within a single congregation or fellowship. And we see little obedience to the commands of Christ in the modern church, but rather theological excuses for why the Sermon on the Mount lifestyle must wait for eternity. I think the most blame can be laid at the feet of our lifestyle. We live like the world. More specifically, we love the intellectual and emotional approach that the world lives by more than we love The Lord and the spiritual kingdom that He is bringing. The Pharisees made many of the same mistakes. Even if we reject adulation by the world (which we would never get anyway) we want to feel we have justified our faith in their eyes. And that is the problem. If we are living for an audience of One, our eye will be single. Otherwise, not so much.

        The description of being discarded is not so much a threat of being burned in fire, as simply getting rid of dead things so they don't rot. Whether this is purging us of aspects that are dead by God's reckoning, or of whole personhood, is a false dichotomy. In the end, when the Father removes the ungodly aspects of our life, we will only have as what is left, what is born of our connection to Jesus. If that is the null set, well, there won't be anything left.

       Jesus promises us a life full of love, joy, and holiness, as a complete package. But to receive it, we have to be connected to the vine of Him, and no other. Bearing fruit, receiving answers to our requests - these are natural consequences of this connection.

John 14:22-31 The gift of peace

John 14:22-26 Another disciple named Judas now asks Jesus what are the circumstances or what is the event that has triggered this change in the way that Jesus will interact with His followers. Jesus does not directly answer his question, although we know that in a few hours, the events will speak for themselves to do so. Instead, He restates the thoughts from the previous few verses. He adds the clarification that it is the Holy Spirit who will teach them everything they need to know and help them to remember everything that He taught them while He was with them in the flesh. Interestingly, He does not say that the Holy Spirit will empower them to keep His word. That comes later. (Luke 24:49)

John 14:27-31 Jesus wraps up His discourse at the Last Supper, in preparation for leaving for the Garden of Gethsemane. He promises peace. That will seem incongruous in a few hours when He is arrested, tried, beaten, and crucified. But He says it is not the world's idea of peace. The peace He promises His disciples is based on the fact that He is going to the Father. When He is there, the greater power of the Father will bring them eternal peace, spiritual peace, peace with God, because He will have, at that point, completed the plan of redemption by dying to atone for the sins of humankind.

          His time is limited, because the ruler of the world, i.e., Satan, is coming. (I John 5:19) He will return to this thought in John 16:11. Jesus and Satan have nothing in common. In one particular aspect is this contrast illuminated. Satan, although He does not have the power or authority to overcome the Father, never voluntarily chooses to do what the Father commands. The world will know that Jesus loves the Father because He does exactly what the Father commands.

          And so Jesus and His disciples depart from the location where they had celebrated the Passover. The other gospels reveal that they went to the Garden of Gethsemane for a prayer vigil.  (Luke 22:39) John 18:1 reveals that they entered this garden after the rest of the words of John 15-17 had been completed. Hence the next three chapters must have been spoken in route. 

John 14:16-21 The Helper

John 14:16-21 Jesus tries to explain  the working of the Holy Spirit to His disciples. It helps to have the Spirit of truth in you, although it is also difficult. The world cannot receive the truth because it lies in the power of the evil one (I John 5:19) who is the father of lies. (John 8:44) We struggle to accept and live in (or out) the truth, or even acknowledge it. It was never God's plan for humankind to struggle with the truth, but Adam and all of his seed (except Jesus) have chosen in part to partake of the adversary's lies. It is a hard road back. But the Spirit of truth is also God and fully loves in revealing truth. There are many dimensions to truth, as there are many dimensions to reality. The Lord does not dump it all on us at once, to bury us as under a dump-truck load of sand. The Spirit of truth reveals it to use a bit at a time, so that we can take it, and bit by bit align our lives with it.                                

          What does truth mean in this context? We think of truth in ordinary life as propositional content that correspond to reality. Truth in this context must mean that it is statements that correspond to spiritual reality. We have a hard time with spiritual truth not because it is intrinsically hard to accept, but because spiritual reality runs against the grain of our natural lives. Hence the incredible patience with which God, in all three of His persons, works.

          In concert with the presence of the Holy Spirit in them, Jesus Himself will come to the disciples and they (we) will see Him and will have life. And then they (we) will know that He is in the Father, and the ones who love Him (Jesus) will be loved by His Father.  And again He includes a reference to the one who has and keeps His commandments. This is proof of love for Him.

          How do we reconcile the grace that Jesus showed and taught with this apparent legalism and conditional love? The Greek word in John 14:21 translated as commandment is entolas, which gives us no relief because it is derived from a similar word usually translated as injunction or prescription.  I think we must interpret this in the same vein that we understand Jesus' parting words to the woman caught in the act of adultery. (John 8:11) No word of God is without power of fulfillment. When Jesus said that the one who has and keeps His commandments is the one who loves Him, He was speaking of it as evidence of the flow of the power of God within that person's life, not as a condition to receive love. The path to disclosure by Christ of Himself to each individual is through a life in which the Holy Spirit flows freely and is allowed to empower that person to live the kingdom life.

John 14:7-15 The Father is revealed in the Son

John 14:7-15 Jesus now tries to clarify one aspect of the nature of the Trinity. While many aspects of the Trinity remain a mystery to us, Jesus presents the important parts. Jesus tells the disciples that those who know Him also know His Father. And the most stunning revelation is that from now on, they have seen the Father.  Philip is incredulous. "Show us the Father." Jesus gently explains to him that they have seen Him and that He is the explicit representative of the Father, fully embodying His nature and character. And beyond having these qualities that are identical to those of the Father, the presence of the Father abides in Jesus, so that Jesus' words and works are really the Father's.

          And then Jesus goes on to reveal what is harder for us to grasp, that the Father is in Him in all that He says and does, but now He is going to the Father. This is the way He was talking about moments earlier. But it is a way to somewhere else. The important things is not where that  somewhere else is, it is the nature of the  Father who is there, and what Jesus will do when He gets there. The ministry of doing the Father's works on earth is now being passed on to the disciples. Jesus has done many things because He saw the Father doing them, such as healing the blind, lame, and deaf, and raising the dead, feeding the hungry, and preaching the good news of the immanence of the kingdom of God. From now on, His disciples would do these things. The key to doing these works is that the Father abides in Him, and He would now abide with and in them, through the Holy Spirit. They would learn to recognize the Father's voice.

          And then we have the promise that if they ask anything in His name, He will do it, so that the Father may be glorified in the Son. This is not a blank check to get anything we want by praying in Jesus' name. It is rather an exposition on the key to effective prayer. When we pray for things that will bring glory to God the Father through the name of Jesus, He will answer these requests. He repeats the condition of it being in His name. And then Jesus adds what seems like a footnote or a condition. Or maybe it is a transition to the next thought. If they (and we) love Him, they (and we) will keep His commandments.

          This seems like an impossible condition. In the Sermon on the Mount (Matthew 5-7) Jesus gives a large number of commands, many of which are impossible. At least, they are impossible for us, unless we are like Jesus. So it seems that Jesus is adding an additional condition to the prerequisites for effective prayer. In addition to praying for something that will bring glory to the Father through Jesus' name, we - the ones who pray - must also be in a lifestyle of keeping Jesus' commandments. An impossible condition. And so this is really a transition to the next section, in which Jesus will explain the role of the Holy Spirit in all this. Because it really is a condition of effective ministry, but it is only possible if we have the flow of the Holy Spirit through our life. 

John 13:32-14:6 Destinations

John 13:32-14:6 Jesus turns now to destinations. He is going away to a place where the disciples cannot follow Him. Peter, ever the uninhibited but loyal follower, wants to follow Him. Peter skips right over Jesus' command that they love each other just as He has loved them. (John 13:34-35, which He returns to in John 17:22-23) Peter believes he is ready to die for Jesus. Jesus’ response to Peter is to not let his heart be troubled even though he is going to deny Jesus before the rooster crows the next morning. The reason for not letting his heart be troubled is that Jesus is going to build a house for each of them and then come back and get them. They know the way, which Thomas is skeptical of, until Jesus explains that He is the way as well as the destination. In fact, He is the only way for them (or anyone else) to come to the Father.

          The building of dwelling places perhaps is foreshadowed by the feast of tabernacles, in which Moses commanded the Israelites to build huts and live in them for seven days. (Leviticus 23:39-43) Even though that feast commemorated the forty years that the Israelites spent in the wilderness after leaving Egypt, when God provided for them supernaturally, and was then fulfilled when Jesus tabernacled among men as a human, there is yet one more fulfillment that Jesus now speaks of. He now speaks of the day when His followers go to live with Him in the Father's presence. His preparation of the way primarily will consist of His going to the cross to atone for the sins of mankind. But secondarily, or perhaps equally, His preparation of that way will consist of speaking the command, with the power of fulfillment, for the disciples to love each other just as He has loved them.

          The sad fact about the reality of the church is that in the twenty centuries since Jesus gave the disciples the simple statement that the way that all men would know we are His disciples would be by our love for one another, the contrapositive has happened. Most men believe that Jesus' followers were not really His disciples, because for the most part they have not loved one another. This includes self-righteous theological disputes, judgmental persecution of those who didn't measure up to the interpretations of Scripture that those in power held to, sectarianism, and great church wars. Whether Jesus’ followers are or are not His disciples, this has been the perception of the world for most of the Christian dispensation.

          Jesus' prophecy of Peter's denial (which was fulfilled in John 18:17 & 25-27) was intended to prepare him for the restoration that would be needed in Peter's soul after the fact. (Matthew 26:75) Jesus was placing in Peter's memory the promise that He would come back and get Peter after He had accomplished the plan of redemption so that He could take Peter to the place He was. And later Jesus had a counseling session with Peter to complete the soul-restoration that would be necessary after his denial. (John 21:15-19)

          The dwelling places in the Father's house are probably a mystery to us by necessity. If we had full understanding of what heaven is like, what life is like in the Father's presence, we would have no need for faith. There are probably other aspects of the life in the body that would be affected as well. So Jesus left us with a promise but very few specifics of this future dwelling place. It will be imbued with and characterized by love. And Jesus is the way to get there. His voice is truth (as He tells Pilate, who is clueless, in John 18:37-38), which is another attribute of the dwelling places He prepares. And in Him is life as John reported to us earlier in the gospel (John 1:4), and also discussed in John 5, 6, 10, and 12.

          What is truth? (Pilate's question in John 18:37) Philosophers have debated this for as long as there have been philosophers. Jesus here reveals that He is truth. The "I am" structure of the sentence carries the implication that Jesus is here identifying Himself with YHWH of the Old Testament, and also revealing that one of the fundamental attributes of God is truth. Jesus is the express revelation of eternal truth. I take this to mean that in everything He said and did, Jesus accurately presented the facts about eternal realities. And these facts about eternity were presented in context and in balance. It is a sad characteristic of humanity that we tend to focus on a small subset of facts and reality and propositional logic and make these out to be the whole truth, often wrenching them from their context, or else blowing their importance out of proportion to other equally true facts. 

          What is eternal life? It must be more than simply unending existence. For many people, life in this world becomes an unendurable burden, and death a welcome rest. This may be due to physical affliction or the pain of emotional or relational stress or breakdown. If what Jesus promises is a continued existence in this condition, it would probably be more like hell than heaven. In this context, Jesus attempts to explain what eternal life in the Father's presence is like. It is characterized by love. The kind of love the Father has for His children, which goes to great lengths to redeem them from their sin. He will wipe away every tear (Revelation 7:17 & 21:4). They will have imperishable bodies (I Corinthians 15:42-57).

          In these three ‘I Am's the fundamental nature of what Jesus is doing is to connect His disciples to the means by which they will get to the ultimate destination that He has promised. Truth and life are attributes that He provides to those who follow Him as a significant part of the way they will get to the destination He has prepared for them. He is preparing them for the destination. Ultimately they will be united with Him at that destination, and partake fully of these attributes.

John 13:31 Now the Son of Man is glorified

John 13:31 With Judas' departure to consummate Jesus' betrayal into the hands of the worldly powers, who are ultimately the devil's stooges, the plan of redemption will be completed. He is preparing them for the events with the proclamation that He will be glorified, and the Father will be glorified in Him, and will in return glorify Him. The term glorify, doxazo, has many implications. Which of them might apply in this case? To celebrate, honor, and magnify sounds close to worship, which is not what is about to happen. Jesus seemed to be saying that this glorification of Himself and the Father was imminent. In retrospect we know that the coming events include His arrest, physical abuse, a mock trial, more physical abuse, and then His crucifixion and His death. In all of these events He displayed divine character. Through all of these events He accomplished the atonement for the sins of the whole world. Although ultimately these things will lead to worship and honor, they did not occur "now". The best description of how Jesus was glorified is perhaps the subdefinition which is "to cause the dignity and worth of a person to become manifest and acknowledged." That is how Judas' treason will bring glory to Jesus and the Father. The facade will be torn away, and the true nature and character of Jesus and of God will be seen by all, and acknowledged by those who will receive Him.

John 13:21-30 Satan and betrayal

John 13:21-30 Jesus became troubled in spirit, because at this point, the time had come for Judas' betrayal of Jesus to be consummated. Perhaps Jesus was troubled because Judas' heart was so full of evil that He could not stomach thinking about it. Or perhaps He was troubled because He knew the moment was at hand for Him to be arrested and face that moment for which He had come - His death. The disciples were still mystified. John speaks of himself in the third person in the mini-drama in which Simon Peter asks John to ask Jesus to reveal who the traitor is. This third-person treatment is perhaps a literary device to communicate modesty because John does not want to say outright, "Simon Peter asked me to ask Jesus who it was because Jesus loved me." In any event, John asked the question and Jesus answered. The morsel that He dipped and gave to Judas was symbolic in some sense, but apparently communicated a real spiritual event. Perhaps Jesus was removing the last protection of the Holy Spirit from Judas, opening him up to receive what he had perhaps only been working towards, which was the full anointing of Satan on his life. These circumstances are a bit puzzling, but the amazing thing is that despite what seems in the text an unambiguous statement by Jesus that Judas was the traitor, the betrayer, the rest of the disciples did not understand what had just happened. They did not understand at that time even though Jesus had just quoted Psalm 41:9 (John 13:18) which identified the one who betrayed as the one who ate His bread, and He had just given Judas the morsel.

          At this point, Judas went out, fully empowered by Satan to betray Jesus. We have no account of his actions until he returns with the crowd of soldiers and Pharisees to arrest Jesus (John 18:1-3). What does it mean to be entered by Satan? There are apparently different levels of participation in the devil's activity. Ephesians 6:11 commands that we put on the full armor of God so that we can stand firm against the devil's schemes. Matthew 6:13 suggests that there is a strong connection between temptation and the devil, which is certainly consistent with the events in the Garden of Eden (Genesis 3:1-19). James 4:7 commands us to resist the devil. I Peter 5:8 warns us that the devil is on the prowl, seeking to devour. But the affliction of the devil described in these passages seems to be external to the believer. There are fewer passages dealing with those whom the devil has entered. I John 3:8&10 speak of the children of the devil, who practice sin. There may be even differing degrees of this, as some who sin do so as an exception (as Adam did, at least initially) and those who sin by choice and by nature. To commit the heinous act of treachery that Judas did would seem to indicate that he fully partook of the devil's nature and character.

John 13:16-20 You are blessed if you do these things

John 13:16-20 Jesus went on to further explain service and fellowship in the kingdom of God. Being a humble servant does not elevate us above anyone we serve, but it does place us in the role and position to which we are called. That role, the same as that to which Adam was called, is to represent God to the world. And when we are acting in that role, whoever receives us receives Jesus and the Father by way of our ministry.

          Is the interposition of the mention of Judas' treachery in the middle of the paragraph germane to this thought or a distraction from it? Perhaps this is meant as a caution. When we are commissioned by God to go to the world with His message and mission, the call comes with great accompanying power. But it is not a blank check. We cannot go to the world in His name but with our own agenda or our own plans. We really do not know what motivated Judas, but that is really irrelevant. Even if we eat His bread (i.e., partake of the sacrament of the Lord's Supper), if we choose our own agenda, then we have not chosen Him, and He has not chosen us. It may look good on the outside, and we may fool people into thinking we speak for God, but He knows who is His.

John 13:4-15 Wash each others' feet

John 13:4-15 Jesus washed the disciples' feet. They all understood what this meant. He was taking the role of a servant. Peter was the one who objected. He understood enough about Jesus to see the complete incongruity of this action. What Peter did not understand was the great inversion in God's kingdom (Matthew 19:30). To be in God's kingdom, we must receive gifts from Him. God's unmerited favor - grace - is the gift by which Jesus' death saves us. But we have to receive it.

          Once Peter understood that he had to accept this gift from Jesus, he wanted as much as he could get. So Jesus had to explain to him in more detail, continuing the foot washing object lesson, that God's grace is sufficient. There are not degrees of salvation and sanctification. We either receive what God offers or we reject it. How much of our life we allow it to affect is a separate matter. But we cannot get more because we already have all of it. Except that Judas had rejected it and so he had none.

          Jesus continued the object lesson with the command that just as they had received God's grace, they needed to give grace to each other. Jesus cleansed them from sin, and paid the price for forgiveness and also empowered them to live in His kingdom, which is to live in His presence, and now He commanded His disciples to do the same in Christian community. They must pay the price for each other to live in each other's presence, including forgiving each other, and empowering each other to live above sin. Washing each other's feet. That is God's plan for His kingdom. And in the end, anyone who opts out will be left out. We cannot be part of his kingdom unless we live this way. 

John 13:1-3 Jesus' hour had come

John 13:1-3 John's record of the last supper has considerably more detail than the parallel accounts in the synoptic gospels. (Matthew 26:20-35, Mark 14:17-31, Luke 22:14-38) He does not describe the specifics in which Jesus consummated the Passover Seder to demonstrate that He was the fulfillment of all that was foreshadowed in it, and instituted the sacrament that we observe as the Lord's supper. (I Corinthians 11:23-25) John was there, he was the one who was lying next to Jesus and asked Him who was it that betrayed Him. (John 13:23-25) What John records is the final words of Jesus to His disciples before His death.

          As a precondition to this, Jesus knew what was going to happen, specifically that Judas was going to betray Him because of what was in his heart. But He also knew that the Father had given everything into His hands. Despite appearances, He was always the one who made the decisions with authority. And He loved His own (the disciples) to the very end, the uttermost. Greater love has no man than this, that he lay down his life for his friends. (John 15:13) His love was ultimately demonstrated - consummated - on the cross, but as far as words can go He bared His soul to His disciples. As the conversation reveals, they were still not comprehending much.

         The additional fact included here is that Jesus knew that He was going to return to the Father. Perhaps this was part of the reason that He had eagerly desired to eat this Passover with His disciples. (Luke 22:15) We have not known intimate communion with the Father as He had. Most likely that is the reason we fear death. Jesus was in a unique situation in this respect.

John 12:44-50 Jesus cried out ....

John 12:44-50 It is not at all clear when and where Jesus made this statement. In John 12:36 it is recorded that Jesus departed from the people and went away. The following verses show John's comments on what had just previously transpired. Chapter 13 appears to start a whole new narrative dealing with the last supper. So when and where Jesus made this declaration is not even hinted at.

          In this passage, Jesus identifies Himself with the Father. The first few verses are essentially a prefiguring of His comments at the last supper in John 14:9-11. The next verse returns to the revelation of spiritual light that has been present in at least four earlier passages in John. (see note to John 12:36) The next two verses deal with judgment. John 12:47 records that Jesus said that if someone hears His words and does not keep them, even then He does not judge them. It is the words themselves that will judge them. He did not come to bring judgment but salvation. But the words that He spoke have this power because they were given to Him by the Father to speak. The Father gave commandment for eternal life, and that is what He sent Jesus to bring and told Him to speak, and Jesus was faithful to come and to speak these words. The seemingly inescapable inference is that the Father sent Jesus to speak words of eternal life, and the one who hears these words and rejects them has, by his or her own decision, rejected eternal life. This passage essentially restates John 3:17-21.

          The important point to see is that our fear of judgment is based on our reaction to His nature of love and holiness. Adam and Eve hid themselves from The Lord God when He was walking in the garden, after they had eaten the forbidden fruit. (Genesis 3:8) The Lord indicated to Moses that this was an appropriate reaction, because no one can see His face and live. (Exodus 33:20) That did not mean that God judged people harshly for their sin and wanted to punish them exorbitantly, but that He is what He is in His intrinsic nature and character, and we cannot bear to experience Him in our fallen estate. So God clothed Himself in flesh in the person of Jesus. And most people love Jesus because He emanates love and holiness. God's nature did not change. But to remedy the problem of us living in His presence and sharing His nature and character, Jesus would have to complete the plan of redemption. And so we move on to the crucifixion and resurrection.

          This statement concludes the public ministry of Jesus. 

John 12:37-43 Who has believed our report....?

John 12:37-43 John provides us a break from the action to give a perspective on all that has just happened. He quotes two passages from Isaiah. John makes two points. Firstly, many chose not to believe in Him despite the miracles He had performed, and the life of Lazarus was a testimony to His power, and therefore His deity. This fulfills Isaiah 53:1. Of course, Isaiah 53 goes on to describe the mission of the Messiah. So it is clear that Isaiah was saying that the suffering servant will not be believed.

          And then John goes on to explain the mechanism of this unbelief, quoting Isaiah 6:9-10. They did not believe because God had hardened their hearts and blinded their eyes. This quotation comes from a passage in which Isaiah had just had a vision of the throne of God, around which the Seraphim called out to one another, "Holy, holy, holy." In response to this vision, Isaiah had cried out "Woe is me, for I am ruined." The problematic aspect of this prophecy is that after this, Isaiah volunteered to go to the people of Israel on behalf of God, and then The Lord told him that He would render their eyes, ears, and hearts unable to see and respond to the message, lest they repent and be healed. Preventing people from recognizing the revelation of God would seem more suited to the adversary than to The Lord.  It almost seems like God is ambivalent about whether He wants the Israelites to repent of their gross immorality, or be judged and punished for it. And during Isaiah's ministry, Hezekiah led Israel in a revival that temporarily postponed judgment on their egregious sins. Perhaps The Lord was reflecting from His eternal viewpoint that He knew that the Israelites' revival would be temporary and that they would fall back into sin. Or perhaps He knew that their repentance was superficial, done in order to curry His favor in their circumstances rather than a genuine change of heart.

          Returning to John's commentary on the events that had just occurred, John notes that Isaiah had just seen the Lord's glory and said these things. And they had just seen God's glory demonstrated in the works that Jesus had just performed. Yet although Isaiah had said that he was ruined, some of these people had rejected Jesus and the testimony of His works, i.e., had rejected the revealed glory of God. And then John goes on to explain that many people actually had believed in Jesus because of the signs He performed, but refused to admit it, because they were unwilling to be put out of the synagogue because of their belief in Jesus. And then he notes that they loved the approval of men more than God. And of course we know in retrospect that this is what led to the crucifixion.

          Perhaps we need to self-examine - when we have seen and experienced the miraculous works of God, are we willing to testify of our faith in Jesus? Or do we love the approval of men so much that we do not? And a deeper question lies beneath this one. Do we believe in Jesus because of His supernatural works, and that we want to receive the blessings that God pours out on His children, or are we willing to change our heart (or allow God to change our heart) so that we are genuinely converted from sin and devoted to Him?

John 12:27-36 Father, Glorify Your Name

John 12:27-36 Whether these thoughts are what troubled Jesus' soul is unclear. This passage parallels some of Jesus' prayers in the garden of Gethsemane (Matthew 26:39 & 42), except that in this case a crowd was nearby. And when God spoke out of heaven, the crowd heard something. Some heard a voice, as they had at Jesus' baptism, (Luke 3:22) but thought it an angel's voice; others heard only thunder. Jesus went on. He spoke of His imminent crucifixion, being lifted up, and its two-fold fruit: the ruler of the world, i.e. the devil, will be judged and cast out; and He will draw all men to Himself. In hindsight we can understand His meaning, but the crowd at that time could not possibly have grasped it. The crowd understood that He was talking about His death, because of their question. How could God's eternal kingdom be established by a Messiah who died? So they questioned whether Jesus really was the promised Messiah.

          Jesus' response to this questioning was to repeat His earlier teaching on light. (John 8:12, 9:5, 11:9) He encouraged them to become sons of the light. He had something very specific in mind. They were to become His sons, and walk as His sons. The darkness was not a bogeyman that would grab them unexpectedly. Rather, darkness was the freely chosen alternative to becoming His sons, and walking in darkness they would not know where they were going, except that it would be away from Him, the light of the world. And then Jesus hid Himself from them.

John 12:20-26 We would see Jesus

John 12:20-26 This opens with an odd statement - that Greeks came up to worship at the feast of the Passover. It is probably reasonable to infer that these were Greek proselytes to Judaism, otherwise this would not make sense. Even though they asked Jesus' disciples to see Him, John does not record that they ever got to talk to Jesus, only that their request was taken to Jesus. Jesus' response is not to them, but rather a statement that He took this as a confirming sign. He reiterates that His glory will consist of dying and being put in the ground like a seed, and the fruit of that seed will be abundant. And that this principle extends to those who follow Him. The only way to be with Him is to lose one's own life. This is perhaps further explained in Luke 9:23-24. Jesus there precedes His statement about losing one's life with the statement that whoever follows Him must daily take up his cross. Obviously taking up a cross as a metaphor for literal death could not be a daily event. But the next verse sheds additional light on Jesus' meaning. What does it profit a person to gain the whole world and lose himself or his soul? Daily cross-bearing must mean something approximately like surrendering one's desires, aspirations, ambitions, and even legitimate needs to the cross. Daily. Not as an odious duty to gain God's permission to continue to exist and enjoy His blessing. Rather, to bear fruit, to experience the joy of The Lord and an abundant life, one's heart must die to the things of the world and the flesh in order to enjoy the transforming power of the kingdom of God.

          The connection of this principle to the Greeks' request seems tenuous. Perhaps Jesus was reflecting God's desire to redeem all of mankind, not just the Jews. This will come eventually, but not under Jewish law and culture. And only after Jesus has died and risen again and sent he Holy Spirit.

John 12:9-19 O Save Us!

John 12:9-11 Since Jesus had returned to metropolitan Jerusalem, word got out and many Jews came to see Him. Evidently the chief priests got wind of it, and planned not only to get rid of Jesus, but also to get rid of Lazarus as he was pretty much an irrefutable proof and a living testimony to Jesus' deity.

John 12:12-19 John's account of the triumphal entry on Palm Sunday parallels that of the other gospels. (Matthew 21:1-11;  Mark 11:1-11; Luke 19:28-44) The cutting of the branches of palm trees and rejoicing before the Lord was actually commanded by Moses to be part of the celebration of the feast of booths. (Leviticus 23:40) This follows the day of atonement in the Mosaic calendar of festivals, in the seventh month of the year, while the Passover (John 12:1) was in the first month of the year (Leviticus 23:5).  There is a mystery here in that the day of atonement that precedes the feast of booths would seem to speak of the crucifixion of Christ, yet the Lamb slain from the foundation of the world is pictured in the Passover. The Mosaic calendar seems to have these as two separate events. In the Mosaic calendar, the Passover was instituted to remind the Israelites to remember their deliverance from Egypt on that day when the death angel slew the firstborn sons of all the Egyptians but passed over the Israelites who had sacrificed the Passover lamb. (Exodus 12:25-27) The feast of  booths was instituted so that later generations of Jews would remember that the generation that had been delivered from Egypt had camped in the wilderness for forty years, sleeping in booths (Leviticus 23:43) Without knowledge of the plan of redemption that was to unfold in the next week, the Jews who celebrated Jesus' entry into Jerusalem combined the observances of the feast of booths at the time of the Passover celebration, at least to the extent of cutting palm  branches and waving them and strewing them in the road. It is also possible that the feast of booths pictures the Incarnation, in which God was tabernacling with man  in Jesus.

          John quotes two Old Testament passages that were fulfilled on this day (Psalm 118:26 and Zechariah 9:9), noting that the disciples did not understand this until Jesus had been glorified. All four gospels report that the crowd was shouting the verse from Psalms. Psalm 118 is a song of thanksgiving that begins with, "Give thanks to The Lord for He is good; For His lovingkindness is everlasting." The body of the psalm gives an account of being delivered, and joyful celebration of that deliverance. Psalm 118:22-23 is quoted by Matthew: "The stone which the builders rejected has become the chief cornerstone. This is the Lord's doing and it is marvelous in our sight." The prophetic aspects of this psalm need no further elaboration.

          Why were the people shouting this Psalm as they waved the palm branches? Most likely it was connected to the Passover, celebrating deliverance from Egypt. That the palm branches were connected to the feast of tabernacles may have nothing to do with the shouts of the crowd.

          The writers of the gospels point out the fulfillment of Zechariah 9:9. It is not clear if the crowd understood this moment that fulfilled prophecy. Zechariah 9 discusses The Lord going to war to deliver the tribes of Israel from the surrounding nations. The verse that is quoted seems almost out of place in this chapter. The imagery in this verse evokes apparent self-inconsistency.  A conquering king would usually ride a very large war-horse. This king, who delivers the tribes of Israel from Hamath, Tyre, Sidon, Ashkelon, Gaza, Ekron, and Ashdod, will enter the gates humbly, riding on a donkey's foal - a very small and unglamorous steed. A vivid picture of the way God Almighty operates.

          Perhaps we should think about why this story is one of the few told in all four gospels, including references to the same Old Testament scriptures. Certainly John, who wrote last, saw no need to repeat most of the details in the synoptic gospels. Including this indicates that he thought it was important for the reader. In the same category as the baptism of Jesus, His crucifixion, and His resurrection. John's unique addition is that he ties this event to the story of Lazarus, as an attesting miracle, the response of people, and the Pharisees' response. It seems to be precisely because Jesus delivered Lazarus from death that He was recognized as a king; in fact as that king foretold by the psalmist and Zechariah, and that He had arrived. Jesus had been preaching the arrival of the kingdom of God for three years or so, and the people were finally getting it! And so this story acts as a gateway to understand that Jesus had come to establish the kingdom of God, and what that kingdom would look like. He showed them a the first part of a picture of authority in the kingdom of God, which would be fully developed in His crucifixion and resurrection.

          The kingdom of God, this type of kingdom, was and is God's response to the cry of the people. 'Hosanna' is usually used as part of a phrase of worship, because it is here followed by a blessing on Jesus. A literal translation of the Hebrew word, which was transliterated into Greek, is 'O save'. The people cried out to be saved, and blessed the one who came to do it. God's kingdom is established in the lives of those who know they need Him and cry out to Him. And ultimately these people, the ones to whom God's kingdom comes, are those who receive Him and allow Him to change and redeem those parts of their lives where His kingdom is established. Otherwise it's all just words, and we are people who are hearers of the Word but not doers of it. (James 1:22-27)

John 12:1-8 The Penultimate Supper

John 12:1-8 Jesus had dinner at the home of Mary, Martha, and Lazarus. We don't know how long this was after Lazarus was raised from the dead, but he was dining with Jesus at table. Jesus was obviously very comfortable here, having worked through the sisterly rivalry revealed in Luke 10:38-42. Martha served dinner. Jesus had explained to Martha that Mary had chosen to lavish her devotion on Him while Martha had chosen to serve Him. Neither call was intrinsically more important than the other. But Lazarus was a living testimony to Jesus' deity, just by his very life.

          Mary's devotion to Jesus was much more ostentatious this time than just sitting at His feet. She had procured an enormously expensive spice, a pound of pure nard, and poured it out on His feet.  Judas complained about this extravagant devotion to Jesus. Since John remarks that Judas intended to betray Jesus, it suggests that he had already made contact with the conspiracy of priests and Pharisees. But John also remarks that Judas did some pious posturing to cover up his real motive. Doubtless Jesus knew about Judas' embezzlement but chose to not make an issue of it. Most likely, He already knew what Judas was up to and that this was part of the Father's plan. But He was not about to let Judas attack one of those wholly devoted to Him without rising to her defense. Really! A thief piously posturing with religious-sounding motives to attack someone with a heart devoted to God, solely so that he could line his own pocket.

          Jesus' remark about the poor was some puzzling. On the face of it, the straightforward interpretation is that Jesus was only on the earth for a short time, so there would be plenty of time later to give to the poor. Jesus' remark about anointing for His burial is telling. He knew that He would shortly be put to death, the conspiracy was afoot, but He also knew that if they wanted to anoint His body for burial, they should do it before He died as Mary had done. He would only be in the tomb for a few days, which would also be the Sabbath days when observant Jews could not do something like that. Hence, only Mary succeeded in anointing Jesus for His burial.

          But what of Jesus' remark that there would always be poor people? Perhaps He was quoting Deuteronomy 15:11. But how do we respond to this? Moses had clearly laid out the duty of those who observe God's law to be generous to provide for the poor. (Exodus 23:11, Deuteronomy 15:7-11) And Jesus did not say that this command was not part of God's new revelation. Most likely, what He reflected was that giving to the poor can alleviate their worst needs, but it would never make them not poor. Because the reasons for poverty are endemic to the current world order, i.e., a world-system based on and saturated with sin. The sociological and economic sources of poverty cannot be eradicated within the world system. No government program, no change of the rules of the marketplace, no revolution of the social norms can eradicate poverty. Under the current world-system, there will always be poor people. Perhaps this will not be true during the Millennial reign of Christ, but Jesus was not here speaking to that.

          It is one of my experiences that poor people, especially those who live on the street, have an experience of the immediacy of God's presence and action in the world far deeper than those of us who live comfortably. In fact, God has chosen the poor of this world to be rich in faith. (James 2:5) The poor know this aspect of God's nature and character because they have nothing else in the way. Jesus reflected on this when He said it is easier for a camel to pass through the eye of a needle than for a rich man to enter the kingdom of God. (Luke 18:25) Having enough money to get by can be very corrosive to faith because it is so easy for us to trust what we can see, and to make choices on what to do. Perhaps Judas was from a rich family. Perhaps he subscribed to the view that cash in hand is the guarantee of provision for life. 

John 11:46-57 The conspiracy

John 11:46-53 Does it not seem ironic that the Jewish leaders who were looking for a deliverer after the type of Judas Maccabeas, and who saw the signs that Jesus performed which demonstrated that God's power was present in Him, were worried that if He went on performing these attesting miracles everyone would believe in Him, and then the Romans would take away their place and nation? What they feared did come to pass, in 70 AD when the Roman general Titus had the city of Jerusalem burned to the ground and the Jews were exiled into another diaspora. But that came about precisely because everyone had not believed in Jesus, and were in a conventional rebellion against Roman authority.

          The intriguing thing about this passage is that even though Caiaphas had a completely worldly view of life, since he was the high priest that year, he prophesied on behalf of God. He prophesied accurately. Somehow God managed to get into his mouth the words that described that Jesus would die and why He would die. And then, bizarrely, having this revelation of God, the Pharisees, the Sanhedrin, and the high priest began to plan for how to bring this about, how to have Jesus killed. And the next few verses suggest that they weren't even very secretive about this, because Jesus responded to this plot by modifying His behavior.

John 11:54-57 Jesus and His disciples went far from Jerusalem, to a city near the wilderness. The Passover was at hand, and the conspirators were probably planning with the expectation that Jesus would show up in Jerusalem to observe the Passover. Many other Jews went up to Jerusalem early to purify themselves in advance of the Passover, but Jesus did not need to purify Himself because He was clean. The Pharisees were on the lookout, but apparently their conspiracy did not have its tentacles far enough to find out what Jesus actually was doing and what His plan was. But the dark angel that they served knew full well what was afoot.

John 11:35-45 Lazarus, come forth

John 11:35 Jesus wept. The shortest verse in the Bible. Did He weep because He loved Lazarus and mourned his death? Did He weep over the consequences of sin that lead to death? Did He weep because the Jews were in the process of rejecting Him? Did He weep because the sisters both lacked faith that He was really God? I vote for the first option. The love of God is manifest in many ways, but the raw emotion of His grief for the things that happen in our life that are not His will is shown here, and ultimately in Gethsemane.

John 11:36-37 The Jews observed the depth of Jesus' grief and commented, exactly as Mary and Martha had, that He could have saved Lazarus if He had been there in time.

John 11:38-45 The sheer simplicity of this scene bares the essence of God's power. Martha makes the remark mentioned earlier, that after four days the body would smell of decomposition. That is why the bodies of dead people are buried. They did not have a morgue with refrigerated coffins to preserve the body. Poor people could not afford to embalm bodies as the Pharaohs did. But the poor people at that time and place had a unique opportunity to witness God's power. As Jesus stated, that if they would believe they will see God's glory. Unlike the rich and powerful, who do not believe in or know God, or anyone else who disbelieves God and yet fears the future judgment. They would see His glory right here, right now. Not a glowing radiance from a heavenly throne, like the visions that Ezekiel and Daniel saw. Not a future kingdom to be revealed at the final judgment. They would see what God's glory looks like in the lives of people here on the earth.

          And then Jesus prays a short, simple prayer. It isn't even a prayer for Lazarus. Instead He thanks the Father for hearing Him, and casts these events as an attesting sign so that they would believe that the Father sent Him. This theme recurs in the high priestly prayer, noted in John 17:8. Jesus is giving a public prayer which is, in effect, not really a petition to God, but a public statement for the benefit of those around Him. Since the work of power would speak for itself, He was casting a framework for what this miraculous sign means. To belabor the obvious, He wanted them to understand that this miracle was a sign from God to confirm to those standing there that God the Father had sent Him.

           When Jesus called out "Lazarus come forth," is there not an echo of God's call to Adam, "Where are you"? (Genesis 3:9). Lazarus had not necessarily sinned in the likeness of Adam's sin, except that in general terms we know that all have sinned and come short of the glory of God. (Romans 3:23) But Lazarus had experienced the fruit of sin (Romans 6:23), and Jesus was demonstrating His redemptive power in calling Lazarus back from that consequence to rejoin life. And in obedience, Lazarus came out of the tomb, still wearing the trappings of death, and Jesus told those around Him to unbind him and let him go. Lazarus was alive again, but still needed to be freed from the vestiges of death. And he needed others to help him with that final act in the drama of resurrection.

          There is no indication that Lazarus was in a spiritual body, as described in I Corinthians 15:44. That is because Jesus was demonstrating God's presence in our present lives, as discussed above. But the life of his physical body had been restored. Presumably, he was still subject to all of the conditions of physical life, including temptation, and also ultimately death of his physical body at some future point. We have no further information on this. And we have to wonder what his life was like after returning from the grave. There are modern accounts of people who have died and been in the presence of God and then returned to physical life. But these accounts seldom deal with what life is like after the return. Was Lazarus so overcome with the light that he had experienced for four days that sin no longer had any appeal to him? Had he experienced such rapturous transport that he spent the rest of his time on earth longing for the day when he would return to heaven? Did he have such a comprehensive understanding of God and His ways that he served Jesus and his sisters faithfully and humbly without complaint or question? The only hint we have is shown in John 12:1-11, the last scriptural mention of Lazarus, and it sheds little light.

          Many who came to Mary to console her and saw Lazarus risen from the dead believed in Jesus. One almost has to wonder why some did not believe in Jesus after seeing the power of God demonstrated.  I suppose that the hardness of some men's hearts is such that they will not repent even if they see one raised from the dead. (Luke 16:31) The name Lazarus appears to be derived from the Hebrew name Eleazar, which means roughly 'God has helped'. 

John 11:20-34 'I am the resurrection and the life'

John 11:20-34 Jesus' interviews with Martha and later Mary go over this ground. Martha knows that Jesus has the power to heal and His presence could have saved Lazarus from death. And in a statement of faith in the face of adversity, she says that she knows that God will do whatever Jesus asks. They have a conversation about resurrection. Martha knows that there will be a resurrection on the last day. She has her eschatology straight. But Jesus intends here to present a stronger case for who God is and who He is and what God's plan is. And that is to be a demonstration of His power in the current life and times of believers, not just at some future final judgment. He is here now, and is establishing His kingdom in power. This is the next of the 'I am's of Jesus recorded by John.

          Jesus said, "I am the resurrection and the life; he who believes in Me shall live, even if he dies, and everyone who lives and believes in Me shall never die." Bear in mind that Jesus said this before He Himself was crucified and rose from the dead (John 19-20). It is natural to think of the resurrection at the time of the end and the final judgment, just as Martha did, as being God's plan, but in doing so, we only have part of the story. Jesus gives us the rest of the story, by intervening with supernatural power in the here and now - in our lives, lived on the earth, today. And He also reveals that He is the agent of God's resurrecting power, and the source of life. Going back to the beginning of John's gospel, John recorded that in Jesus was life (John 1:4). Since He created life in the first place, it follows that He also can recreate life through resurrection.

          At this point, it seems to be appropriate to clarify what resurrection means. There are probably a large numbers of views popular in today's culture that are not supported by scripture. For example, there is the concept of Zombies - those who act as though they are alive even though they are really dead. Another example is the concept of ghosts, that is, the disembodied spirits of those who have died but live on in an ethereal bodiless form. But the most complete description of the Biblical understanding of resurrection is found in I Corinthians 15:35-54. Our current earthly body is a seed, which is sown as dead. It is sown in dishonor but raised in glory. The natural body dies, but the spiritual body is raised. The spiritual body will bear the image of Christ Himself.  It is an imperishable and immortal body, at which point, as Isaiah 25:8 says, death will be swallowed up in victory.

          The power of God to raise us up and give us eternal life and eternal bodies that bear His image certainly implies no limits to what He can do. Our understanding is limited to some extent because we have not seen these things. We don't know the exact order of events, but there are a few other people Jesus had raised to life (Luke 7:11, 8:41) that are recorded in the other gospels, which may well have taken place before this event. But in those cases, the death had been relatively recent. In this case, Lazarus had been dead for four days and his body would have started decomposing (John 11:39). God created Adam from the dust of the ground (Genesis 2:7); there is a common tendency to take the viewpoint (Deism) that once God set the universe in motion, He took His hands off and left man to follow His instructions with no direct intervention. Jesus here intends to show that this is wrong, by doing a work of power that is irrefutably divine intervention in the affairs of man. God answers prayer, and it is not just a psychological adjustment of our view of life.  He is involved in our life and in our world, and cares about our pain.

John 11:1-19 Lazarus is sick

John 11:1-16 John mentions that Lazarus was the brother of Mary, and identifies her by an incident that occurs later (John 12:3). Jesus loved Martha and Mary and Lazarus, but He deliberately delayed His return when He heard Lazarus was sick. When He announced His intention to return, after waiting, His disciples reminded Him that on previous visits to Judea, twice the Jews had tried to stone Him. Jesus' response seems rather obscure. He had already told them that this sickness was not to death but to His glory. He  responds with a reference to Himself as the light of the world (John 1:4-5, 8:12). This highlights the different perspectives between Jesus and His disciples. On purely human terms, they saw a risk to Jesus' life. On a purely divine perspective, Jesus saw His mission and the obvious necessity of doing the Father's will, bringing light to the world. He was that light. If that led to death, so be it. To miss the Father's will would be to stumble as though walking in darkness, which He was trying patiently to get the disciples to get.

          Jesus went on to explain, first by symbolism and then directly, that Lazarus had died. Thomas the twin at least seems to have grasped part of what it meant to obey the Father. He was prepared to die with Jesus if that was the will of God. The whole conversation sounds rather morbid, but Jesus knew the outcome.

John 11:17-19 Jesus delayed two days, but we find when He arrives in Bethany that Lazarus had already been in the tomb four days. So even if He had left immediately, He would not have arrived before Lazarus died. Sometimes when it seems like God has abandoned us, we learn that the basic circumstances were against us, that the world had pre-determined and achieved disaster for us and on us, before He was ever called on. Yet this does not limit His power to redeem, as the following story illustrates.

          Apparently Mary, Martha, and Lazarus were well-respected by the Jews of Jerusalem since many came to console Mary and Martha. In that day and age, it may be that Lazarus was the sole breadwinner in this household of siblings, and perhaps Mary and Martha were wondering what would become of them - how they would get by - with him gone. 

John 10:19-42 At the Feast of Dedication

John 10:19-30 seems to be just a reference back to the on-going disputations recorded in chapter 9. It is not entirely clear if this is a continuation of the previous interchange or a different and subsequent date. The Jews ask a question that was already answered. He had also given them miraculous signs of His authority. They had both words and power. What did they want? Jesus answered that question too. They did not believe because they were not His sheep, and did not know Him. He does not dwell on reasons why they do not know Him. But He simply says that He knows His sheep, they hear His voice and follow Him, and He gives them eternal life. He adds a new revelation. No one can snatch them out of His hand, because His Father is greater than all and no one can snatch them out of the Father's hand. And then the clincher, answering the question they asked, He declares that He and the Father are one.  There is no clearer claim to deity in all of the New Testament.

          There is further elaboration on this in John 17, in which Jesus prays to the Father for His disciples, and makes clear the Father's role in their lives.

John 10:31-42 The Jews had previously picked up stones to stone Jesus in John 8:59 after Jesus had declared His deity by saying, "before Abraham was, I AM", identifying Himself as one with YHWH. Instead of leaving as in that case, this time He tries to engage them in discussion. The Jews claim to be following the Law of Moses, which required the death penalty for blasphemy (Leviticus 24:16). Jesus responds with a quote from Psalm 82:6, which is in the context of a rebuke of unjust judgments. In the first five verses the Psalmist says that God will take a stand and judge the unjust judges, those who show partiality to the wicked. The Psalmist urges the rulers to vindicate the weak, orphans, the afflicted, and the needy.  The Psalmist goes on to explain that the unjust judges walk in spiritual darkness, even though they are gods and are sons of the Most High. Nevertheless they will die like men and fall like princes who are judged.  Jesus then once again cites the witness of the miraculous signs that He had performed as evidence that the Father was in Him and He was in the Father.  The fourth commandment (Exodus 20:7) is to not take the name of YHWH in vain. Perhaps what Jesus was trying to convey by these contrast of verses, is that doing good in God's name is not taking His name in vain. It is the opposite, claiming His name to justify evil, that is taking it in vain.

          Since they rejected His explanation, Jesus avoided arrest by escaping out of their hand. The text gives no further details on how Jesus avoided arrest. He went to the place mentioned in John 1:28, and many people came to Him there. The logic seems strained. John performed no sign, but had borne witness to Jesus (John 1:29-36), and therefore many people believed in Jesus there. The people had accepted John as a prophet and so his testimony had some weight, but Jesus did miraculous signs. Of course, Jesus had pointed to all of the different types of witness in John 5:33-47. But at this point many began to believe in Him. Not in the Temple, but at the place in the wilderness where John had baptized many.