EPISODE 5 John Chapter 5 ”Outrageous Claims?”

Thank you for joining us for this edition of Share the Word, the podcast that explains the big ideas in the New Testament chapter by chapter. I'd like to suggest that you hit pause if you need to and open your Bible or Bible app. That way you can follow along and make sure that what we're teaching is consistent with what's written. Okay, let's get started with today's lesson. I showed you a photo of a man named Robert Lee Yates and said, Guess what this fellow is famous for, just off his appearance. I don't think many would recognize him.

He looks to me like he could be your insurance man, maybe your son's football coach. But he's in prison right now serving a 400-year sentence for killing more than 20 women in his hometown of Spokane, Washington. No one looking at this guy would have guessed he was a serial killer, certainly not the 20-some young women who climbed into his car willingly. The police said that's what made him able to keep committing this same crime over and over in the same town, even though everyone knew what was going on. Robert Yates looked so average. People expect a serial killer to look like Richard Ramirez or Charles Manson, somebody visibly unusual or threatening.

Of course, this can work both ways. I remember a friend of mine telling me his mom years ago often served coffee to a scruffy old man at a diner in New York City where she worked, figuring just by his appearance that he was probably a homeless person, only to later learn actually it was Albert Einstein. Appearances can be very misleading. Tell me, what do you think Jesus looked like? It's interesting that none of the gospel writers ever say. Does that mean anything?

I read years ago there was a documentary about Jesus done in Britain that upset a lot of people. It wasn't the content so much as the fact that the actor who played Jesus was short and dark and slightly chubby. That didn't play very well. You probably have some mental image of Jesus too, what he looked like. Where did it come from? Maybe a picture or a statue in the church building you grew up in, or something printed in your Sunday school literature, or maybe one of the movies that's been made about Jesus over the years in Hollywood.

In those, Jesus is usually portrayed as tall and slender and fair-skinned, very serene-looking. You know, it's highly unlikely he looked at all like that. In fact, my hunch is he was very usual-looking for his society at the time, so average, in fact, that none of the gospel writers even thought it important to describe his appearance. The closest thing we have to a physical description of Jesus in the Bible comes not from his contemporaries, but from a prophecy about the Messiah written centuries before. Isaiah once wrote about the Messiah, He has no beauty nor majesty to attract us to him, nothing in his appearance that would cause us to desire him. That's from Isaiah 53.

Jesus probably was not taller than his contemporaries. Neither did he likely have light hair. As for sure, he had no supernatural aura glowing around him, no halo of light. John the Baptist, the last of the Old Testament prophets who called Israel to repentance to prepare the way for the Messiah, admitted he would have never recognized Jesus as the one if God had not given him an unmistakable sign. Physically speaking, Jesus could blend right into a crowd and be very anonymous. And sometimes he did exactly that when he wanted to escape notice.

That's what we're going to see happen in John chapter 5, where we're looking today. Keep in mind that John's Gospel is not written as a kind of week-by-week journal of Jesus' life. He wrote many years after these events and selected only a handful of scenes to recount. Things which in his mind best served to prove his purpose. That is, that this ordinary appearing man, Jesus from Nazareth, whom he had spent about three years with, was in reality the Christ, that's the Messiah, the unique Son of God here on a mission to save us. And that by believing into him, we can gain eternal life.

That's how John himself states his purpose for writing his gospel in chapter 20, verse 31. So as we come to chapter 5, we're once again taken to the scene of something extraordinary that happened in Jerusalem, when Jesus and his disciples were there during one of the feast days. That's what the Jews called their religious holidays. Here is how John sets the scene. Now there is in Jerusalem near the Sheep Gate a pool, which in Aramaic is called Bethesda, and which is surrounded by five covered colonnades. Here a great number of disabled people used to lie: the blind, the lame, the paralyzed.

In the northeast corner of the city, and this has been excavated, by the way, there was a large pool in Jesus' time. Actually, it was two connected pools sitting side by side with covered porticos on all sides and a fifth running between the two pools. Sadly, it had become a place where some of the most pitiful people in Jerusalem were brought and often left. It was crowded with helpless people, hurting people, blind people, invalids, very ill people. I'm pretty sure there is an artist's rendition of this place in the Rainbow Bible. That's a popular children's edition when I was a kid.

I spent a lot of time studying those pictures in my Rainbow Bible during long Sunday sermons. I can still see the picture titled Jesus at the Pool of Bethesda in my mind's eye. I can actually smell it. I can feel it if I close my eyes. Try to picture this place. Can you imagine what it must have been like?

Can you hear the moaning echoing across the pools off those stone walls? Can you smell the dampness? Can you feel the hopelessness? A lot of suffering and a lot of dying was going on there. To add to this pathetic situation, there was a superstition attached to this place that said every so often God comes down by an angel and stirs up the water, and when that happened, the first person in the pool would be healed. Of course, that's not true.

God would never set up such a cruel contest. And that note, which may appear in your Bible if you have an older version, was added by someone later. It's not a part of what John actually wrote. But that superstition may very well explain why all these poor people were left there. Jesus brought his disciples to this heartbreaking place one Sabbath day. John remembers how they met a man there they learned had been lying by this pool for 38 years. 38 years.

Imagine spending a lifetime essentially abandoned there. How odd then that John recalls Jesus, when meeting this helpless man, asked him, Do you want to get well? That's what he said. Do you want to get well? What a question. The poor man, I'm sure, hardly knew how to respond to that.

He tried to explain at first that he was incapable of getting into the pool even if the water was stirred. He's apparently at least partially paralyzed and needs someone else's help to even move. But Jesus directed him, Get up, pick up your mat and walk. I'm sure at first, in disbelief, but then seeing this fellow seemed serious, the man who had lain helplessly by this pool for 38 years at Jesus' direction actually was able to get up. He tested his limbs for a moment, incredulously. Then he rolled up his mat and began walking to and fro.

His atrophied muscles were wholly restored, his joints seemed to be working normally. At only Jesus' word, he was instantly made completely well. You can imagine how this created quite a scene as the man began rejoicing and people from nearby gathered around in amazement. I imagine him high-stepping it around the pool, maybe even literally jumping for joy, and soon an excited, curious crowd had gathered, wanting the man to try and explain what had just happened. It was during that excitement that Jesus and his disciples slipped away from the scene unnoticed. These pools were only a very short distance from the busy temple district.

Word of something miraculous happening spread to some of the religious authorities there, who shortly arrived to investigate. Now, wouldn't you think they'd be greatly interested in this man's story? Amazingly, that was not what they were interested in. What immediately concerned them, that was Sabbath rules appeared to have been broken. Yes, for one thing, this fellow was unlawfully carrying his mat on the Sabbath. What?

Yes, he violated one of their most religious rules. You could do no work on the Sabbath. Carrying his mat, packing up his meager belongings, that sounded like work to them. When they confronted him, he told them that the man who had healed him told him to do it. Oh, really? And just who was that?

The now healed man looked around, and he realized he didn't recognize anyone that looked like Jesus. Or maybe he saw a lot of people that looked pretty much like Jesus. In any event, he couldn't identify the man that had healed him. He had no idea who Jesus was. He could not tell if any of the people around him were Jesus or not. It wasn't until later, apparently that same day, that Jesus found this man among the crowds at the temple, where he had gone to thank God for his miraculous healing.

They talked for a few moments, and it was from this meeting the man learned who Jesus was. Sadly, because he was intimidated by the authorities, he immediately went and reported that information back to them. They weren't glad to hear it. The religious authorities were already familiar with Jesus, remember, from his earlier clashes with them at the temple, when he drove out their money changers and vendors. I think there are at least two big reasons John decided to include this event in his gospel. Since our intention is to focus on the big ideas in each chapter, each podcast, I'll mention both of them, but I want to concentrate more on the second.

The first obvious reason John shares this memory, I think, is because of the amazing sign that he and others witnessed. Remember, sign is his word for a miracle, but miracles that he thought had a deeper spiritual significance. They pointed to something greater. Well, what's greater than a healer who can do such an outstanding miracle? John knew, and so should have the temple priests. One thing that would identify the Messiah when he finally appeared would be the ability to do extraordinary healing miracles.

The prophet Isaiah again had foretold the days of the coming Messiah in Israel like this. Then, he said, the eyes of the blind will be opened, the ears of the deaf will be unstopped, the lame will leap like deer, and the tongues of the mute sing for joy. It's Isaiah 35. Since John's purpose is to demonstrate that Jesus was, in fact, the Messiah Isaiah and the other Old Testament prophets promised was coming, John saw in this miracle one clear sign confirming Jesus' identity. The sign was undeniable. So many witnesses were there who knew this man.

He'd lain helplessly by this pool for decades. So many witnesses, including John himself, saw him now miraculously fully restored at Jesus' command. What prevented the religious authorities from seeing this? Instead, later that day, it touched off another major confrontation between Jesus and these same religious leaders at the temple, which brings me to the second reason I believe John tells us all about this. During the subsequent confrontation with the temple officials, Jesus said some very remarkable things, made some very outrageous claims that John was struck by. Yes, Jesus may have looked very ordinary.

There probably was nothing at all physically unusual or remarkable about him, but oh, the things he said. When he spoke, especially when he was aroused, as he was in this case by the attitude of Israel's religious leaders, he said some things that were absolutely jolting. I'm sure I too would have been struck by the jaw-dropping claims that came out of his mouth. When Jesus spoke, people listened. He was fearless, and he spoke with a kind of unique authority and intensity that was striking and unforgettable. People would often remark, I've never heard anyone speak like this before.

Let's think through some of the things that John remembers and records here in this chapter. Jesus saying to the religious leaders on this occasion. Remember, it all started because they took offense that he had broken their Sabbath rules by simply telling a man he had healed to roll up his mat. But it certainly didn't end there. Listen to what John wrote about this, beginning at verse 16. Because Jesus was doing these things on the Sabbath, the Jewish leaders began to persecute him.

In his defense, Jesus said to them, My Father is always working to this day, so I'm working too. For this reason, they tried to kill him, not only because he was breaking the Sabbath law, but he was even calling himself God's own Son, making himself God's equal. The temple bosses heard Jesus correctly when he said, My Father works every day, so as his Son, I do the same. Another time he put the claim just this bluntly: The Son of Man is Lord even of the Sabbath. Jesus claimed in no uncertain terms that their rules about what could and could not be done on the Sabbath day, which was their holy day, did not apply to him. They took that as Jesus claiming to be equal with God since he believed he was above the rules for ordinary men, since he insisted that whatever the Father does, he as the Son should also be doing.

It was not only his right, it was his obligation. I have to believe the religious leaders' eyes were wide in disbelief when they heard Jesus say these kinds of things. But he was just getting started here. Next, Jesus promised them that they'd see more amazing things from him than what happened that day by the pool, the healing of this paralyzed man. He told them, beginning at verse 21, Just as the Father raises the dead and gives them life, even so the Son gives life to whom He is pleased to give it. The religious Jews believed that God would, in fact, raise the dead at the end of time.

But Jesus was claiming to be able to raise the dead just like God. Moreover, and he's on a roll now, he said, The Father judges no one. He has entrusted all judgment to the Son, that all may honor the Son as they honor the Father. Whoever does not honor the Son does not honor the Father who sent Him. So he's claiming that at the time of judgment, it's actually going to be Him who will be doing the judging. They couldn't believe what they were hearing from this normal-looking man.

And Jesus continued on, So if you think you honor God, you had better start listening to and honoring Me. Can you even imagine the religious leaders listening to that? It was outrageous. Their ignorant response to the healing of the paralyzed man obviously got Jesus very wound up, and it's like he's saying, And another thing, and another thing, and another thing. He's giving them a piece of his mind. Truly, truly, he continued, Whoever hears My word and believes in Him who sent Me will have eternal life and will not be judged and has crossed over from death to life.

Truly, truly, I tell you, a time is coming and now has come when the dead will hear the voice of the Son of God, and those who hear it will live. Jesus, just as He did with Nicodemus, now again, this time even more emotionally, warns these men that their own personal salvation, whether they would be resurrected at the end of time to spend eternity with God or be judged and condemned, ultimately will come down to whether they will accept Him and His claims. Whether they will accept that he, in fact, is God the Son come to Earth on a saving mission from the Father. Wow. By the way, whenever you hear Jesus use that formula, truly, truly, or verily, verily, as the older versions put it, that means, you better hear me good, because what I am telling you now is the absolute truth. Do you see now what I mean by outrageous claims?

Jesus' words not only shocked people, but forced those who heard him to make a decision about him. And there were really only two available alternatives: they, and I guess we as well, can either be open to considering his claims, or else utterly reject them as rantings of someone insane, or worse, a blasphemous spiritual deceiver. Do you see why, when people heard this kind of thing from Jesus, they were either drawn to him and came to believe in him, or else angrily concluded, He's crazy, or maybe, He's demon-possessed. This very ordinary-looking man making all these outrageous claims, to even entertain the notion they could be true required entertaining the possibility that they were somehow looking at God on Earth in human flesh, or as John put it in chapter one, the Logos becoming flesh and living among them. I love the way the Christian philosopher C. S.

Lewis puts this. Speaking at a conference once, Lewis made this proposition. Listen. I am trying here to say and prevent anyone from saying the really foolish thing that people too often say about Jesus. I'm ready to accept him as a great moral teacher, but I don't accept his claim to be God. That's the one thing we must not say.

A man who was merely a great man and said the sort of things Jesus said would not be a great moral teacher. He would either be a lunatic on the level of a man who says, I'm a poached egg, or else he would be a devil from hell. You must make your choice. Either Jesus was and is the Son of God, or else he was a madman or something worse than that. You can shut him up for a fool, you can spit at him and call him a demon, or you can fall at his feet and call him Lord and God. But let us not come with any patronizing nonsense about his being a great human teacher.

He's not left that option open to us. He did not intend to. That's it exactly. John in this gospel many times has Jesus making these sorts of jaw-dropping claims. This was no isolated event. His claims were definitely outrageous.

That doesn't mean they weren't true. John is explaining to us how he himself was driven to believe into Christ as the Messiah and the Son of God. What he witnessed firsthand, what he heard, what he saw, what left him with no other reasonable conclusion to come to. We're now five chapters into John's gospel. Is he causing you to rethink who Jesus really was? Stay with the story.

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