Harmony Of The Gospels

Harmony #13: The Galilee Miracles (4 Stories From Galilee)

As Christians, we are dualists – that is, we think there are two parts to reality in our universe: the natural and the supernatural. We are open to the supernatural as an explanation when things at times happen that are beyond our ability to explain scientifically or naturally. It could be that we don’t understand nature and the “laws” God gave it properly yet….but it could be that the explanation will require something supernatural. These are both live options for us dualists.

Those who do not believe in the supernatural here us say something like this cartoon shows (“Then a miracle occurs.”) They see it as a giving up too easily, or trying to find places for God to fit in a world where science makes God unnecessary.

As  Christians, miracles matter a lot to us. The heart of our faith is the Resurrection. That is the miracle that must have occurred in order for our faith to be valid. For a Resurrection you need an Incarnation – and that’s a miracle.  For the world in which the Incarnation occurs, you need a Creation – and that’s a miracle.  For the new life the Christ offers to all of us – we need a miracle. It’s not just the life of Jesus or what’s recorded in the book of Acts. This has been part of church history for over 2,000 years.

  • Clement of Rome and Ignatius of Antioch speak of the miracles

  • Origen:  exorcisms, healings, and fulfilled prophecy

  • Irenaeus: magic-workers of his day "cannot give sight to the blind nor hearing to the deaf, nor put to flight demons; and they are so far from raising the dead as Our Lord did, and the Apostles, by prayer, and as is frequently done among the brethren, that they even think it impossible."

  • Justin Martyr:  his speech to the Roman Senate appealed to miracles done publicly in Rome.

  • Tertullian: challenged the local magistrates to work the miracles which the Christians perform.

  • Augustine:  wrote a long list of miracles he saw, with names and details, described them as well known, and said they happened within the previous two years.

  • Gregory the Great:  told Augustine of Canterbury not to be elated by the many miracles God was doing through him for the conversion of the people of Britain.

  • Craig Keener (who we will mention later) has a fantastic two volume set on verified modern miracles.

Unfortunately, we use “miracle” in so many different ways that we can become confused concerning what we are actually talking about.  We talk about the miracle of birth and miracle finishes for sports matches; I use Miracle Grow for my garden. When roundabouts get done 10 weeks early we say, “It’s a miracle!”

Here’s our definition that reflects the biblical view: “A supernatural interaction with the natural world in which an event that would not have otherwise occurred does occur.” Now that we have a definition, let’s look today at three main objections before we move into the stories.

 

Objection #1: Miracles are so unique, so unusual, so improbable, it is more probable that the testimony against ‘uniform experience’ is false than that the event is true. (#David Hume) It is more likely that the witnesses lied than that the uniform laws of nature were broken. However, uniform experiences (‘laws’) are like an “average”; they tell us a lot about life in general, but not necessarily about life in detail. Here are some actual modern events recorded in Craig Keener’s book:

  • Keener tells of of “a young woman on her deathbed, almost completely paralyzed from multiple sclerosis. She heard Jesus’ voice calling her to rise and walk, and she was instantly healed so thoroughly that she didn’t even have to contend with atrophied muscles. All three of her doctors have confirmed the account in writing, laying their own reputations on the line. She lived for 40 more years with no recurrence.”[1]

  • Another story he documents is of a woman blind for 12 years, instantly healed during prayer, a fully documented case now written up in a medical journal.

The laws of nature (dead people don’t come back to life; there is no medical cure for MS or blindness) are called laws not because they are actual laws, but because they are so overwhelmingly common that we know what’s going to happen in the ordinary course of human events (people who die stay dead; people who are blind or have MS will always have these things).

However, we reached that conclusion based on observation. If observation were to reveal that there are instances where the dead do, in fact, come back to life, then the ‘law’ needs a new definition, something like this: “Barring supernatural intervention, the dead do not come back to life in the natural course of events.”[2]

C.S. Lewis noted this with Hume’s argument. Not only is experience not his friend, but also there is something illogical in Hume’s argument:

“If there is absolutely “uniform experience” against miracles, in other words, they have never happened, why then, they never have. Unfortunately, we know the experience against them to be uniform only if we know that all the reports of them are false.  And we know all the reports are false only if we know already that miracles have never occurred.  In fact, we are arguing in a circle.”  C.S. Lewis

  

Objections to Miracles #2: Natural explanations can be provided for most miraculous claims. If not, it’s just because we don’t understand the world well enough yet (i.e., quantum physics).

Say a person is medically documented to have been healed of blindness. I and the person objecting to miracles are both filling in a gap. We both agree the event lacks a known natural explanation; we both are offering a way to fill in that gap with a plausible scenario. Because I believe in God as portrayed in the Bible, I think there are two possible explanations, neither of which should be dismissed out of hand. Miracles are on the table. Tim McGrew[3]gives a great response to the idea that miracles should be dismissed out of hand:

“Deep in the heart of a great forest, a bird who has never seen a human being lives in contentment at the top of a large and flourishing tree. One day he flies miles to the north and spends a day eating grubs in a marsh. The day is clear and fine, with scarcely a cloud. 

 When the bird returns in the evening, the tree where he has lived lies flat upon the ground, neatly severed at the base. Our bird knows that trees with dead branches sometimes snap and fall in the wind or even collapse under their own weight. He knows that severe storms can split or knock down even an apparently healthy tree. 

 But in his experience, without exception, healthy trees do not suddenly fall on sunny days. Yet there the tree lies. What is the bird to think, and what should his skeptical friends think of his testimony that the tree did, indeed, fall? In all of the bird’s experience up until now, man has never played a role.  

But now his world has been invaded by a higher order of being that can make things happen the bird has never experienced or imagined. The generalization he has formed — that healthy trees, left to themselves, do not fall down on sunny days — is true as far as it goes. But this tree was not left to itself.”

I asked a skeptical friend once what it would take to believe miracles. It became clear NOTHING would convince him. No matter how much scientific evidence I suggested or how many eyewitnesses I could produce, he said he would always believe that we just didn’t understand something about the natural world.  No matter what, we have been left to ourselves.

If no natural criteria can explain an event, it’s at least worth considering that a supernatural explanation - something (or someone) - has interacted with our world. We have not been left to ourselves.

 

Objections to Miracles #3:  Miracles  make the efforts of science useless, because science relies on a predictable, cause/effect universe.

I’ve heard an analogy comparing God’s miraculous intervention in the world to the way events are influenced inside a fishbowl. If someone bumps the fishbowl, the pebbles will shake and the water will ripple.  If the fish are committed to seeking an explanation only inside the fishbowl, they will never find an adequate explanation for what happened. Maybe they think believing otherwise allows for a “God” who violates the laws of the nature in the fishbowl.

We, however, know that if the fishbowl hadn’t been reacted to the bump, laws governing a reality much bigger than just the fishbowl would have broken.  In other words, an orderly and predictable world still demonstrates ‘cause and effect’ when miracles occur.  Had the fishbowl not responded, that would actually be the problem. I like C.S. Lewis’s response from his book Miracles: 

“Miracles, if they occur, must, like all events, be revelations of that total harmony of all that exists... In calling them miracles we do not mean that they are contradictions or outrages; we mean that, left to her [Nature] own resources, she could never produce them… there are rules behind the rules, and a unity which is deeper than uniformity."

I put this foundation in place because the next four stories in the life of Jesus involve miracles (and we’ve already seen the water turned into wine). If we plan to take the Bible seriously, we must take the reality of miracles of seriously. Miracles are foundational to the story line over and over. There are implications for us today (more on this at the end).

I’m putting these four together because as a group they tell us something important about Jesus, as well was as how God works in the world.

Healing the Royal Official’s Son – Cana, Galilee (Jn 4:46-54)
 Now Jesus came again to Cana in Galilee where he had made the water wine. In Capernaum there was a certain royal official, an officer in Herod’s service, whose son was sick. When he heard that Jesus had come back from Judea to Galilee, he went to him and begged him to come down and heal his son, who was about to die.

So Jesus said to him, “Unless you people in Galilee see signs and wonders you will never believe!”[4] “Sir,” the official said to him, “come down before my child dies.” Jesus told him, “Go home; your son will live.” The man believed the word that Jesus spoke to him,[5] and set off for home. While he was on his way down, his slaves met him and told him that his son was going to live.

So he asked them the time when his condition began to improve, and they told him, “Yesterday at one o’clock in the afternoon the fever left him.”  Then the father realized that it was the very time Jesus had said to him, “Your son will live,” and he himself believed along with his entire household.

Jesus did this as his second miraculous sign[6] when he returned from Judea to Galilee.

Calling Four Disciples - Sea of Galilee (Mt 4:18-22; Mk 1:16-20; Lk 5:1b-11)
As Jesus was walking along the Sea of Galilee he saw two brothers, Simon (called Peter) and Andrew his brother,
[7]casting a net into the sea (for they were fishermen).

He saw two boats by the lake, but the fishermen had gotten out of them and were washing their nets. He got into one of the boats, which was Simon’s, and asked him to put out a little way from the shore. Then Jesus sat down and taught the crowds from the boat. When Jesus had finished speaking, he said to Simon, “Put out into the deep water and lower your nets for a catch.”

Simon answered, “Master, we worked hard all night and caught nothing! But at your word I will lower the nets.” When they had done this, they caught so many fish that their nets started to tear. So they motioned to their partners in the other boat to come and help them. And they came and filled both boats, so that they were about to sink.

When Simon Peter saw it, he fell down at Jesus’ knees, saying, “Go away from me, Lord, for I am a sinful man!” For Peter and all who were with him were astonished at the catch of fish that they had taken, and so were James and John, Zebedee’s sons, who were Simon’s business partners.

Then Jesus said to Simon, “Do not be afraid; from now on you will be catching people. Follow me, and I will turn you into fishers of people.” So when they had brought their boats to shore, they immediately left everything and followed him.

Going on from there Jesus saw the two other brothers, James the son of Zebedee and John his brother, in the boat with Zebedee their father, mending their nets. Then he called them.[8] They immediately left the boat and their father and followed him.

Casting Out an Unclean Spirit – Capernaum, Galilee (Mk 1:21-28; Lk 4:31-37)
Lk 4:31 Then Jesus and his disciples went down to Capernaum, a town in Galilee. When the Sabbath came, Jesus went into the synagogue and began to teach. The people there were amazed by his teaching, because he taught them like one who had authority, not like the experts in the law.

Now in the synagogue there was a man who had the spirit of an unclean demon,[9] and he cried out, “Ha! Leave us alone, Jesus the Nazarene! Have you come to destroy us?[10] I know who you are—the Holy One of God!”  But Jesus rebuked him: “Silence! Come out of him!” After throwing him into convulsions in their midst, the unclean spirit cried out with a loud voice and came out of him, without hurting him.[11]

They were all amazed so that they asked each other, “What is this? A new teaching with authority and power![12] He even commands the unclean spirits and they obey him and come out!” So the news about him spread quickly throughout all the region around Galilee.

Healing at Simon Peter’s House – Capernaum, Galilee (Mk 1:29-34; Lk 4:38-41; Mt 8:14-17)
Now as soon as they left the synagogue, they entered Simon Peter and Andrew’s house, with James and John. Simon’s mother-in-law was lying down, sick with a high fever, so they spoke to Jesus at once about her and asked him to help her.

Standing over her, Jesus rebuked the fever, raised her up by gently taking her hand, and the fever left her.[13]Immediately she got up and began to serve them. When it was evening, as the sun was setting,  the whole town gathered by the door.  Those who had any relatives sick with various diseases or demon-possessed brought them to Jesus.

He placed his hands on every one of them and healed them, and drove out the spirits with a word. Demons came out of many, crying out, “You are the Son of God!” But he rebuked them, and would not allow them to speak, because they knew that he was the Christ.

In this way what was spoken by Isaiah the prophet was fulfilled, “He took our weaknesses and carried our diseases.”

* * * *  

Through these miracles, Jesus demonstrates his power:

  • over death

  • over nature

  • over evil spirits

  • over sickness

All of this to make clear that He is the prophesied Messiah. There is nothing left over which to demonstrate power. He has covered both the seen and unseen world. There is nothing that has been left alone. He also defies being placed neatly in a formula box when he intervenes miraculously in people’s lives:

  • Showed power over death to a wealthy despised Gentile[14] who asked for a miracle.

  • Showed power over nature to ordinary, believing Jewish laborers (the disciples) who didn’t ask for a miracle.

  • Showed power over evil spirits to a demon-possessed man (in a synagogue, no less) who actively tried to push Jesus away.

  • Showed power over sickness to an honored woman on whose behalf others asked for a miracle

If I look at these 4 stories and ask myself, “What does it take for someone to experience a miraculous intervention in their life?” the answer is, “Jesus.” He was demonstrating that the Kingdom of God had been inaugurated in Jesus.

I believe God still works miracles today. Many of you have experienced it in your own life. At minimum, it’s the miracle of the new birth and the process of Holy Spirit sanctification. Things have happened in us that could not have happened just in the course of the natural world unfolding. God has not left us alone.

Perhaps you have seen more than that. Perhaps it has been something you could see with your eyes that happened in the ‘seen’ parts of the world, events that demonstrated God’s power and reminded you that God can do miracles in the unseen parts of the world (emotional, mental and spiritual healing of soul and spirit). Even if you haven’t seen those, the Bible records Jesus’ miracles of the seen that demonstrate his power in the unseen, and that alone is a faithful and sufficient witness.[15]

This morning, I want to encourage us to pray for the supernatural intervention of God in our lives and in the world.

  • Pray for the war in Ukraine to end.

  • Pray for salvation and righteousness for the leaders in our nation.

  • Pray for those you know who are far from Christ.

  • Pray for your family and friends in all kinds of need.

  • Pray for the work of the Holy Spirit to produce the fruit of the Spirit.

  • Pray holiness and righteousness to rise.

  • Pray for wisdom, patience, peace, joy, love, hope…

  • Pray for….

And when we experience in ourselves that supernatural work of God, or when we see or hear of the power of God’s presence at work in others around us, may it remind us that we have not been left alone. The King of the universe is near.

Recommended Resources:

Miracles.  C.S. Lewis.

Miracles: The Credibility of the New Testament Accounts. Craig Keener.

“Miracles: Is Belief in the Supernatural Irrational? “John Lennox at Harvard

“A Defense of the Rationality of Miracles,” Brett Kunkl

MBA Episode 64: Explaining Miracles To Kids with Matthew Mittelberg (Hillary Morgan Ferrer, Mama Bear Apologetics)

“Miracles Are Outlasting the Arguments Against Them.” Craig Keener, in an interview at Christianity Today

Miracles in Church History, by William Young. https://biblicalstudies.org.uk/pdf/churchman/102-02_102.pdf


___________________________________________________________________________________

[1] Craig Keener, interviewed at https://www.christianitytoday.com/ct/2022/january-web-only/craig-keener-miracles-today-supernatural-god.html

[2] Irenaeus, (late 100s) wrote, “As I said. even the dead have been raised and remained with us for considerable years… Nor does the Church do anything by angelic invocations, nor incantations, nor other perverse meddling. It directs prayers in a manner clear, pure, and open, to the Lord who made all things, and calls upon the name of our Lord Jesus Christ.” https://biblicalstudies.org.uk/pdf/churchman/102-02_102.pdf

[3] Christian philosopher at Western Michigan University

[4] “In general, we find that the Lord Jesus was not as pleased with a faith that was based on miracles as He was with that which was based on His Word alone. It is more honoring to Him to believe a thing simply because He said it than because He gives some visible proof.” (Believer’s Bible Commentary)

[5] “Long-distance miracles were rare by Old Testament, other Jewish, and Greco-Roman standards; people generally believed prophets and Greek magicians more easily if they were present in person. The rare stories of long-distance miracles suggested to ancient readers that these miracle workers had extraordinary power.” (Zondervan Illustrated Bible Backgrounds Commentary Of The New Testament)

[6] John will record 7 signs.

[7] Andrew and Simon Peter had earlier left John the Baptist to follow Jesus (Jn 1:35-51). This account, appears to be the formal calling of these men… “This is actually the second time Jesus called Peter and Andrew. In John 1:35–42 they were called to salvation; here they are called to service.” (Believer’s Bible Commentary) 

[8] “The normal pattern in Israel was for a prospective disciple to approach a rabbi and ask to study with him. Perahyah said, “Provide thyself with a teacher and get thee a fellow disciple,” which Rabban Gamaliel echoed, “Provide thyself with a teacher and remove thyself from doubt.” At the inauguration of his kingdom mission Jesus establishes a new pattern, because he is the one who takes the initiative to seek out and give a call.” (Zondervan Illustrated Bible Backgrounds Commentary Of The New Testament)

[9] “Judea, in our Lord's time, abounded with demoniacs. First, [the people] were then advanced to the very height of impiety. See what Josephus, their own historian, says of them: There was not (said he) a nation under heaven more wicked than they were. Secondly, Because they were then strongly addicted to magic, and so, as it were, invited evil spirits to be familiar with them.” (Adam Clarke commentary)

[10] “Only God could destroy demons. In Jewish tradition God’s inbreaking reign meant the destruction of Satan and his minions.” (NIV Biblical Theology Study Bible)

[11] Justin Martyr, in the mid 100s, wrote to the Roman rulers: “You may learn from what goes on under your own eyes. For many devil-possessed all over the world, and in your own city, many of our men, the Christians, have exorcised in the name of Jesus Christ, who was crucified under Pontius Pilate. When all other exorcists and sayers of charms and sellers of drugs failed, they have healed them, and still do heal, sapping the power of the demons who hold men, and driving them out.” https://biblicalstudies.org.uk/pdf/churchman/102-02_102.pdf

[12] Jesus’ authority over impure spirits characterizes his ministry (vv. 3234393:11225:1–207:24–309:14–27; cf. 3:156:713; see note on v. 24) and here reinforces the authority of his new teaching. It demonstrates that he has already bound Satan (3:27) and is “the one more powerful” whose coming John proclaimed (v. 7).” (NIV Biblical Theology Study Bible)

[13] “Just as Jesus “rebuked” the demon (see 4:35; cf. also 4:41), so now he “rebukes” (epitimaō) the fever. This does not mean that the fever is a demonic presence. Though illness was often associated with spiritual oppression in the ancient world and is sometimes so linked in Luke’s Gospel (8:299:3911:1413:11), elsewhere in Luke Jesus’ healings are distinguished from his exorcisms (see 4:40417:2113:32).” (Zondervan Illustrated Bible Backgrounds Commentary Of The New Testament)

[14] The commentaries I read believe this man lived among the Jewish people but was not Jewish.

[15] “The most dramatic miracles happen most often (though not by any means exclusively) on the cutting edge of evangelizing unevangelized areas, a setting similar to the one in the Gospels and Acts. They also happen where they are most needed—not to entertain us, not to get us to neglect other resources God has provided, but because of the Lord’s compassion for our need.” https://www.christianitytoday.com/ct/2022/january-web-only/craig-keener-miracles-today-supernatural-god.html

Harmony #12: The Year Of The Lord’s Favor - Part 2 (Luke 4:16-30; Matthew 13:53-58; Mark 6:1-6)

 Now Jesus, with his disciples following him, came to Nazareth, his hometown where he had been brought up. He went into the synagogue on the Sabbath day, as was his custom, and began to teach the people. He stood up to read, and the scroll of the prophet Isaiah was given to him. He unrolled the scroll and found the place where it was written, 

“The Spirit of the Lord is upon me, because he has anointed me to proclaim good news to the poor. He has sent me to proclaim release (redemption) to the captives and the regaining of sight to the blind, to set free those who are oppressed, to proclaim the year of the Lord’s favor.”[1] 

Then he rolled up the scroll, gave it back to the attendant, and sat down. The eyes of everyone in the synagogue were fixed on him. Then Jesus began to tell them, “Today this scripture has been fulfilled even as you heard it being read.”[2] 

Points from last Sunday:

(a) It is possible that really godly people are right in front of us and we don’t see it. (“Surely, God is in this place and I did not know it”.)

(b) The response of wonder at Jesus’ teachings and works was coupled with persistent unbelief and rejection. (Wonder isn’t the same as worship. People can be amazed by Jesus and far from God.)

(c) God has concern for the poor and oppressed of all kinds. (Physical care and spiritual care go hand in hand. #both/and)

(d) Without the freedom Jesus brings, freedoms turn into either indulgence or oppression. (In Christ, we are freed from sin and to righteousness. Our freedom is holy – set aside for God’s purposes.)

This brings us to the 5th and final observation.

It is significant that Jesus stopped reading with the words “ … to proclaim the acceptable year of the Lord.” He did not add the rest of the words from the passage in Isaiah: “and the day of vengeance of our God.”

Eventually, when John the Baptist goes to jail, his disciples will ask Jesus if he actually is the one they are looking for, or if they should look for someone else.[3] This was after JTB had clearly identified Jesus as the promised Messiah already, confirmed with a supernatural confirmation at Jesus’ baptism, let alone all the miracles he surely knew about.

I wonder if they were counting on the day of vengeance. Where was the promised physical freedom, the judgment on the oppressors? Do you remember how the Jewish crowds will eventually choose Barabbas over Jesus? They wanted the Zealot in their midst, someone who had a violent agenda to overthrow Roman oppression.

In a very practical sense, when was John going to get out of jail?  Was there going to be two Messiahs, maybe, a good cop/bad cop team? Why isn’t fire falling from heaven? (Something Jesus’ disciples will request later – and be denied).[4] Here’s what happened in response:

“At that very time Jesus cured many who had diseases, sicknesses and evil spirits, and gave sight to many who were blind. So he replied to the messengers, “Go back and report to John what you have seen and heard: The blind receive sight, the lame walk, those who have leprosy are cleansed, the deaf hear, the dead are raised, and the good news is proclaimed to the poor. Blessed is anyone who does not stumble on account of me.” (Luke 7:21-23)

In other words, they saw him fulfill Isaiah’s prophecies concerning the Messiah. Why on earth would anyone stumble over this? I suspect it was because the point of his Incarnation was not to bring practical vengeance on Roman oppressors or the final Day of Judgment that John records at the end of Revelation. Jesus came to proclaim that the year of the Lord’s favor had arrived thanks to Jesus coming to earth to fulfill His mission of salvation.

I want to anticipate a response before we move on. This declaration does not mean Jesus’ death and resurrection did away with the need for justice to address sin and evil. John will record Jesus also saying this:

“For judgment[5] (from krino: distinguish; separate; render a verdict) I am come into this world, that they which see not might see; and that they which see might be made blind.” (John 9:39)

So how do we balance “for judgment I have come into the world” with, “God did not send his son into the world to condemn it, but to save it”? (also recorded by John in chapter 3 of his gospel). Well, John helps us in his own text:

“And this is the judgment (same root word): the light is come into the world, and people loved the darkness rather than the light; for their works were evil.” (John 3:19)

It is inevitable: when light is introduced, it separates light from darkness. This is a principle as old as Genesis 1.

And God said, “Let there be light,” and there was light. God saw that the light was good, and he separated the light from the darkness. (Genesis 1:3-4)

The light was a blessing; but the light is not the darkness (obviously), and the introduction of light makes clear the different nature of light and dark. As it is physically in the Old Testament, so it is spiritually in the new. A new kind of light is introduced, and it clarifies the chasm between spiritual light and spiritual darkness. Those who love the darkness will face judgment not because Jesus forced it on them, but because they have chosen the darkness. Here’s a good explanation for the judgment question from Ellicott’s Commentary:[6]

“The special form of the word rendered “judgment” in this place is used nowhere else by St. John, and indicates that…His coming was a bringing light into the darkness of men’s hearts, a testing of the false and the true, and as people accepted or rejected Him they pronounced a judicial sentence upon themselves. That light judged no one, and yet by it everyone was judged.” (Ellicott’s Commentary For English Readers)[7]

The purpose of His First Coming was to announce that the acceptable year of the Lord, or the year of the Lord’s favor, had arrived. Over and over in his ministry, Jesus pointed toward the goodness of life in the Kingdom of God.  In just the first few recorded incidents in his public ministry, we see three key components put into place:

  • He explained the path to Kingdom citizenship (be born again).

  • He described the worship (in spirit and truth).

  • He described the outcome (“proclaim good news to the poor, redemption to the captives, sight to the blind, freedom to the oppressed, and the year of the Lord’s favor.”)

God revealed His plan for bestowing favor through the Incarnation of Jesus, who came to proclaim the grace and mercy of the gospel, the Good News of forgiveness and hope. God, through Jesus, has taken upon Himself the eternal judgment people deserve, and offers LIFE in a glorious, heavenly kingdom that begins now and moves into eternity.[8]

John the Baptist’s message was, “Repent and flee from the wrath to come.”[9] The reality of condemnation paves the way for the message of reconciliation. That groundwork had been laid. In Jesus’ first three encounters with people after the cleansing of the temple, he focused on the life that God offers.

The life is characterized by freedom from the power and condemnation of sin and freedom toflourish in our heart, soul, mind and strength, which will inevitably be expressed in working to help others flourish in the same way.

And if that’s the focus of Jesus, I think it’s safe to assume that our focus, as the people of Jesus, should be the same. We, as God’s ambassadors, have been empowered by God to carry on the message of Jesus.   

  • We too, proclaim that Jesus has the power to bring freedom to those bound in oppression of all kinds;

  • We, too, proclaim that Jesus has the power to bring healing to the spiritually sick, sight to the spiritually blind, mobility to the spiritually lame, and he has shown us this by bringing physical healing to prove He has the power to do in the realm of the unseen what he can do in the world of the seen;

  • We, too, are ‘broken and spilled out’ for the suffering and needy both spiritually and physically, demonstrating the heart of the Great Physician who brings hope and healing to bodies and souls.

I wonder if people experience us as people joyfully proclaiming that this time period in which we live has been shown favor through the life, death and resurrection of Jesus.  How much time do we spend pointing with excitement toward what God offers to the world through Jesus to those inside and outside the Kingdom of God? How often do we simply proclaim (and demonstrate) the beauty of life in the Kingdom to those both near and far from Christ? In other words, are we known for majoring for what we have been freed to?

I was raised in a church environment that focused more on John the Baptist’s message of fleeing the wrath to come than on loving Jesus and being captivated by what life in His Kingdom looks like. I constantly avoided hell instead of embracing heaven. I fled from the wrath to come at every revival meeting, but that almost never included running toward a glorious, risen Savior who offered me life abundant. I was more excited about skipping hell than I was experiencing heaven. I was more focused on avoiding Satan than pursuing Jesus.

Once again, we don’t ignore that the wages of sin is death, and bringing that point home can include helping the spiritually sick see their sickness and thus their need for the Doctor. But surely we are meant to major on the major point: the gift of God is eternal life through Jesus Christ, our Lord. [10]

If we get so busy looking behind us to flee what’s nipping at our heels, we will lose our way because we have lost our focus. We have to see where we are going, and who we are following. We fix our eyes on the prize of the high calling we have in Christ Jesus.[11] We follow Jesus because we have been captivated by the person and promise of Jesus.  

As I look back over my meager 53 years, I think I spent far too much time looking behind me to avoid being singed by the fire (and frankly, trying to figure out how close I could get without getting burned.) When all that motivates you is avoiding punishment, you’re going to see how much you can get away with. How much sin can I do and still avoid hell?

Jesus didn’t come so I could flirt with sin effectively and get away with as much as I could. He came to give me an abundant, holy life in which I live in God’s design and favor. 

And when we - the oppressed, the captive, the blind, the hungry, the sick for whom Jesus died, and to whom He offers the good news of a salvation, redemption, healing and freedom – when we proclaim and live that message…. Well, I’ll let Isaiah remind us of what happens.

  • Then your light will break forth like the dawn, and your healing appear;

  • your righteousness will go before you…

  • you will call, and the Lord will answer…

  • your light will rise in the darkness…”

  • your descendants will be known among the nations

  • all who see will acknowledge that you are a people the Lord has blessed.

We rightly pray for revival in our town and in our land. We are in desperate need of it. It sure seems like it begins with us being rightly revived. It’s then that God’s people reflect the light of Jesus brilliantly and powerfully into a world smothered in darkness.

_________________________________________________________________________________

[1] The year of the Lord’s favor (Grk “the acceptable year of the Lord”) is a description of the Year of Jubilee (Lev 25:10). The year of the total forgiveness of debt is now turned into a metaphor for salvation. (NET Bible Commentary) Jesus reads Isa 61:1 – 2, with an added line from Isa 58:6 (tradition suggests that synagogue readers were allowed to “skip” material when reading the Prophets). Isa 61:1 – 2 probably evokes the Year of Jubilee (Lev 25), in which all slaves were to be released. Although Jesus’ reading ends with salvation, his audience would know that the passage goes on to announce also judgment. (NIV Cultural Backgrounds Study Bible)

[2] Regaining of sight may well mean more than simply miraculously restoring physical sight, which itself pictures a deeper reality (Luke 1:77-7918:35-43). Oppressed may well mean more than simply political or economic oppression, but a deeper reality of oppression by sin (Luke 1:77-7918:35-43). The essence of Jesus’ messianic work is expressed in the phrase to set free. This line from Isa 58 says that Jesus will do what the nation had failed to do. It makes the proclamation messianic, not merely prophetic, because Jesus doesn’t just proclaim the message—he brings the deliverance. “ (NET Bible Commentary)

[3] Luke 7

[4] Luke 9

[5] “The precise form of word for ‘judgment’ occurs nowhere else in this Gospel. It signifies not the actof judging (John 5:22John 5:24John 5:27John 5:30) but its result, a ‘sentence’ or ‘decision’ (Matthew 7:2Mark 12:40Romans 2:2-3, &c.), Christ came not to judge, but to save (John 3:17John 8:15); but judgment was the inevitable result of His coming, for those who rejected Him passed sentence on themselves (John 3:19). See on John 1:9 and John 18:37.” (Cambridge Bible For Schools And Colleges)

[6] We can feel a similar tension on the issue of peace. Over and over, we read about the peace that Jesus brings; specifically, “Peace on earth to those on whom his favor rests.” “He is our peace”; “Peace I give and leave with you.” Jesus brought peace. How do we reconcile this with his  statement in Matthew 10:34: "I came not to bring peace, but a sword."? The answer, I believe, is that Jesus is simply observing that not all will accept that Jesus is who He claimed, and disagreement over this issue will lead to conflict. See 2,000 years of history for how that dynamic has unfolded.

[7] More ways of thinking about this: “His coming would manifest the disposition and character of every man. The humble, teachable, and upright, though they were as much in the dark with respect to religion and the knowledge of divine things, as the blind man had been with respect to the light of the sun, should be greatly enlightened by his coming: whereas those, who in their own opinion were wise, and learned, and clear-sighted, should appear to be, what they really were, blind, that is, quite ignorant and foolish.” (Benson Commentary)

“As those are most blind who will not see, so their blindness is most dangerous who fancy they do see. No patients are managed with so much difficulty as those who are in a phrensy, who say they are well, and that nothing ails them. The sin of those that are self-confident remains; for they reject the gospel of grace, and therefore the guilt of their sin remains uncancelled; and they grieve and quench the Spirit of grace, and therefore the power of their sin remains unbroken. Seest thou a man wise in his own conceit? Hearest thou the Pharisee say, We see? There is more hope of a fool, of a publican, and a harlot, than of such.” (Benson Commentary) 

“Nothing fortifies men's corrupt hearts against the convictions of the word, more than the high opinion which others have of them; as if all that gained applause with men, must obtain acceptance with God. Christ silenced them. But the sin of the self-conceited and self-confident remains; they reject the gospel of grace, therefore the guilt of their sin remains unpardoned, and the power of their sin remains unbroken.” (Matthew Henry’s Concise Commentary)

[8] John 10:10

[9] Matthew 3

[10] Romans 6:23

[11] Philippians 3:14

Harmony #11: The Year Of The Lord’s Favor (Luke 4:16-30; Matthew 13:53-58; Mark 6:1-6)

In today’s passage, Jesus is going to read from the Old Testament, then apply it in such a way that his hometown tries to kill him. To better understand what’s happening, we need to know the passages to which he was referring. (And like Jesus does in His reading, I am going to excerpt the parts that make my point J) 

Isaiah 42 

“Here is my servant, whom I uphold, my chosen one in whom I delight; I will put my Spirit on him, and he will bring justice to the nations. In faithfulness he will bring forth justice; 4 he will not falter or be discouraged till he establishes justice on earth. In his teaching the islands will put their hope. 6 “I, the Lord, have called you in righteousness; I will take hold of your hand. I will keep you and will make you to be a covenant for the people and a light for the Gentiles, 7 to open eyes that are blind, to free captives from prison and to release from the dungeon those who sit in darkness.

ISAIAH 58

“Declare to my people their rebellion and to the descendants of Jacob their sins.For day after day they seek me out; they seem eager to know my ways, as if they were a nation that does what is right and has not forsaken the commands of its God. They ask me for just decisions and seem eager for God to come near them.‘Why have we fasted,’ they say,‘ and you have not seen it? Why have we humbled ourselves, and you have not noticed?’“ Yet on the day of your fasting, you do as you please and exploit all your workers. Your fasting ends in quarreling and strife, and in striking each other with wicked fists. You cannot fast as you do today and expect your voice to be heard on high. Is this the kind of fast I have chosen, only a day for people to humble themselves? Is it only for bowing one’s head like a reed and for lying in sackcloth and ashes?


Is that what you call a fast, a day acceptable to the Lord? 6 “Is not this the kind of fasting I have chosen: to loose the chains of injustice and untie the cords of the yoke, to set the oppressed free and break every yoke? Is it not to share your food with the hungry and to provide the poor wanderer with shelter— when you see the naked, to clothe them, and not to turn away from your own flesh and blood? Then your light will break forth like the dawn, and your healing will quickly appear; then your righteousness will go before you, and the glory of the Lord will be your rear guard. Then you will call, and the Lord will answer; you will cry for help, and he will say: Here am I. If you do away with the yoke of oppression, with the pointing finger and malicious talk, 10 and if you spend yourselves in behalf of the hungry and satisfy the needs of the oppressed, then your light will rise in the darkness, and your night will become like the noonday.

Isaiah 61 

The Spirit of the Sovereign Lord is on me, because the Lord has anointed me to proclaim good news to the poor. He has sent me to bind up the brokenhearted, to proclaim freedom for the captives and release from darkness for the prisoners, 2 to proclaim the year of the Lord’s favor and the day of vengeance of our God, to comfort all who mourn,  and provide for those who grieve in Zion— to bestow on them a crown of beauty instead of ashes, the oil of joy instead of mourning, and a garment of praise instead of a spirit of despair…And you will be called priests of the Lord, you will be named ministers of our God…Their descendants will be known among the nations and their offspring among the peoples. All who see them will acknowledge that they are a people the Lord has blessed.”

 

The Jamieson-Fausset-Brown Bible Commentary has a nice summary of the ‘acceptable year of the Lord’ or ‘the year of the Lord’s favor’:

“An allusion to the jubilee year (Leviticus 25:10), a year of universal release for person and property. As the maladies under which humanity groans are here set forth under the names of poverty, broken-heartedness, bondage, blindness, bruisedness… so, as the glorious Healer of all these maladies, Christ announces Himself in the act of reading it.”

 Jesus’ audience understood the implication for them if the year of the Lord’s favor had arrived. Not only would all the wrongs they had experienced as a people be made right, but their personal lives would be characterized by blessing. 

Also, it clear that when God’s people were characterized by justice and righteousness during this time of favor, God planned to use them mightily. It wasn’t just the individuals helped; it was the witness to the goodness of the God whose people were doing this work. But…. when they didn’t do this – when they failed to honor God’s priorities even while being really pleased with themselves – well, God was going to get His people’s attention. 

* * * * *

Welcomed in Galilee (Jn 4:43-45; Lk 4:14-15; Mk 1:14b)
After the two days Jesus, in the power of the Spirit, departed from there to Galilee and proclaimed the gospel of God. So when he came to Galilee, the Galileans welcomed him because they had seen all the things he had done in Jerusalem at the Passover Festival (for they themselves had gone to the feast). News about Jesus spread throughout the surrounding countryside, and he began to teach in their synagogues and was praised by all.
 

Rejected in Nazareth (Lk 4:16-30; Mt 13:53-58; Mk 6:1-6)
Now Jesus, with his disciples following him, came to Nazareth, his hometown where he had been brought up. He went into the synagogue on the Sabbath day,
[1] as was his custom, and began to teach the people. He stood up to read, and the scroll of the prophet Isaiah was given to him. He unrolled the scroll and found the place where it was written, 

“The Spirit of the Lord is upon me, because he has anointed me to proclaim good news to the poor. He has sent me to proclaim release (redemption) to the captives and the regaining of sight to the blind,[2] to set free those who are oppressed, to proclaim the year of the Lord’s favor.”[3] 

Then he rolled up the scroll, gave it back to the attendant, and sat down. The eyes of everyone in the synagogue were fixed on him. Then Jesus began to tell them, “Today this scripture has been fulfilled[4] even as you heard it being read.”[5]

 Time out. These passages, in their fullness, are hopeful passages to Jesus’ audience. Remember all the blessings, the ways God planned to use his just and righteous people? Fantastic! The audience must be psyched that Jesus applied this passage to them. Perhaps that’s way… 

All were speaking well of him, and were amazed at the gracious words coming out of his mouth. They said, “Where did he get all these ideas? And what is this wisdom that has been given to him? What are these miracles that are done through his hands? Isn’t this the carpenter, the son of Mary and Joseph, and brother of James, Joses (Joseph), Judas, and Simon? And aren’t his sisters here with us? Where did he get all this?”

Jesus said to them, “No doubt you will quote to me the proverb, ‘Physician, heal yourself!’ and say, ‘What we have heard that you did in Capernaum, do here in your hometown too.’ “(“Prove it!”) And he added, “I tell you the truth, a prophet is accepted with honor except in his hometown, and among his relatives, and in his own house.”[6]

Okay, something happened between them speaking well of him and being amazed at his gracious words, because Jesus response to their questions reveals they he (as we will see at the end of this story) is amazed at their unbelief. If I could add a soundtrack to their paragraph of question, it would from something happy to something really brooding. There’s a seemingly ugly shift in the undertone. “You’re that amazing, huh? From your family? Prove it to our faces, here. Do some cool miracles for us like you did in Jerusalem.” And here is where Jesus, who had just returned from the Samaritans, really makes them angry.  

 “In truth I tell you, there were many widows in Israel in Elijah’s days, when the sky was shut up three and a half years, and there was a great famine over all the land. Yet Elijah was sent to none of them, but only to a [Gentile] woman who was a widow at Zarephath in Sidon. And there were many lepers in Israel in the time of the prophet Elisha, yet none of them was cleansed except the [Gentile], Naaman the Syrian[7][8] When they heard this, all the people in the synagogue were filled with rage[9] and took offense at him.[10] 

Translation: The Nazarites are the ones in Isaiah 58 who are the rebels, living ‘as if they were a nation that does what is right and has not forsaken the commands of its God.’ They were the ones who, on the day of fasting, did as they pleased and exploited all your workers. Their fasts ended in quarreling and fighting with wicked fists. And, as Isaiah had said, “You cannot fast as you do today and expect your voice to be heard on high.” 

They got up, forced him out of the town, and brought him to the brow of the hill on which their town was built, so that they could throw him down the cliff.[11] But he passed through the crowd and went on his way. Jesus did/could not do many miracles there because of their unbelief[12]— except to lay his hands on a few sick people and heal them. And he was amazed because of their unbelief[13]. Then he went around the villages and taught.

(a) First observation: it is possible that really godly people are right in front of us and we don’t see it.

We dishonor others and rob ourselves of the input of the godly around us if we don’t see those whom God has placed ‘in our own country.’ They might even be in our own family, our own circle of friends, our own church. I wonder if there is a human tendency to think of the impressive, exotic and exciting things happening far away from us, when the reality is that God is at work in our midst. “Surely, God was in this place and I did not know it,” said Jacob. In the kingdom of God, the extraordinary is often hidden in the ordinary. 

I have been amazed over the years at the wealth of human resources in Northern Michigan. Famous, brilliant people live right here. Because I coach, I am aware of area athletes from small schools who go on to play professional sports. It’s no different in the local church. Godly, righteous people are seated in this room. We just have to get to know each other.  

 

(b) Second observation: The response of wonder at Jesus’ teachings and works was coupled with persistent unbelief and rejection. 

Wonder is not the same as worship. There was no real appreciation of His true identity or worth; all that mattered was how impressive he could be.[14] When Jesus only matters because he entertains us or makes our lives easy, we aren’t following Jesus the crucified Savior. We are following Jesus the court jester. I’m thinking of the movie Gladiator: “Are you not entertained!!” By the way, as far as we know, Jesus never returned to Nazareth.[15]

Jesus didn’t come to entertain us; he came to redeem us. If our love of Jesus hinges on how happy we feel or cool He looks or what kind of bells and whistles get added to our lives, we have badly missed the point. “My grace is sufficient.”[16] That alone should evoke awe, and wonder, and trust, and allegiance. 

 

(c) Third observation: God has concern for the poor and oppressed of all kinds.[17]

I have said this before: I think the physical realities in the Old Testament point toward spiritual realities in the New Testament. The poor, the enslaved, the blind, the thirsty, the hungry, the naked – God’s people were called to care about their situation physically in the Old Covenant.  

The New Covenant does not change that, but I think now the focus is on the spiritual application. Think of it as another example of, ‘You have heard it said, but I say unto you…’ Jesus didn’t do away with what they had heard; he added another layer to it that usually had to do with the heart and soul.

Jesus did not come to destroy the Law but to fulfill it, so we get to care about people in both ways.  Isaiah talked about the Year of the Lord’s favor over and over as involving justice.  Justice is a big deal to God. It will characterize the presence of His favor. 

I hate that in our current cultural climate, the world “justice” has been redefined or hijacked in such a way that followers of Jesus have started to argue against its importance. We don’t need to run from it; we need to reclaim it. It’s a crucial part of ‘the acceptable year of the Lord.’ We can be for setting captives free physically and spiritually, for feeding the hungry physically and spiritually, for ending oppression physically and spiritually, for bringing sight to the blind physically and spiritually. In the Kingdom of God, this is both/and, not either/or.

 

(d) Fourth observation: Without the freedom Jesus brings, freedoms turn into either indulgence or oppression.

Christ is the only Liberator whose liberation lasts forever.[18] This is why a focus on physical freedom is doomed without the foundation of spiritual freedom, which not only frees us from something, but to something. Social justice movements, as well intended as they may be, will always distort into some type of injustice without the guidance of knowing what true freedom is,and what true freedom is for.

“You were called to freedom. Only do not use your freedom as an opportunity for the flesh, but through love serve one another.” (Galatians 5:13)

Far too often in history, the oppressed have either arisen only to replicate the oppression,[19] or they have exploited that freedom until their indulgence destroyed them. Unguided or unfocused freedom almost always devolves into the improper use of either power or pleasure, both of which can be terribly destructive. 

We see this in the Nazarites. Here is a people violently oppressed by Rome and sneered at by other Jewish communities because of their origins (“Can anything good come from Nazareth, in Galilee of the Gentiles?”) You would think they would be conscious about a) not using violence to acuse others, and b) not holding someone’s origins against them. But in a venue where they have the freedom to choose how to treat someone, they choose to replicate both those things. 

Lives freed from the bondage of people need to be guided by hearts freed from the power of sin. The Gospel freedom that Jesus brings to hearts, souls and minds is crucial if we are going to exercise the power of earthly freedoms.

When Jesus talks about freedom, He’s pointing toward not just what he frees us from, but what he frees us to. This vision is found throughout the Bible, but honestly, just looking at what Jesus and Isaiah say paints a great foundational image of what it looks like to live in freedom in the favor of God. 

  • A world in which the poor have their needs met is good; a world in which the poor in spirit get their needs met also is even better. God’s people get the privilege of being involved in both. 

  • A world in which physically oppressed captives are freed is good; a world in which the spiritually chained captives are freed from sin and spiritual oppression also is even better. God’s people get the privilege of being involved in both.

  • A world in which the physically blind and lame regain sight and mobility is good; a world in which the spiritually blind and lame regain their sight and learn to walk in the Kingdom is even better. God’s people get the privilege of being involved in both.

I have a final point next week. Meanwhile, let’s simmer on how Jesus declared himself. 

“The Spirit of the Lord is upon me, because he has anointed me to proclaim good news to the poor. He has sent me to proclaim release (redemption) to the captives and the regaining of sight to the blind,[20] to set free those who are oppressed, to proclaim the year of the Lord’s favor.”[21]

__________________________________________________________________________________

[1] “That this is the last time in the Gospel where Jesus is associated with a synagogue suggests this rejection marks a significant break in his relationship with the institution and the Judaism it represents.” (NIV Biblical Theology Study Bible)

[2] “For judgment I came into this world, so that (Same purpose as here in Lk 4:18) those who do not see may see (Good News), and that those who see may become blind.” (Bad News) Those of the Pharisees who were with Him heard these things and said to Him, “We are not blind too, are we?” Jesus said to them, “If you were blind (I.e., if they recognized their state of spiritual blindness, humbled themselves, and cried out to God to "heal" them) you would have no sin; but since you say, ‘We see,’ (I.e., In a state of total self-deception and steadfast rejection of the "sight giving Gospel") your sin remains. (John 9:39-41) (commentary quoted in Precept Austin)

[3] The year of the Lord’s favor (Grk “the acceptable year of the Lord”) is a description of the Year of Jubilee (Lev 25:10). The year of the total forgiveness of debt is now turned into a metaphor for salvation. (NET Bible Commentary) Jesus reads Isa 61:1 – 2, with an added line from Isa 58:6 (tradition suggests that synagogue readers were allowed to “skip” material when reading the Prophets). Isa 61:1 – 2 probably evokes the Year of Jubilee (Lev 25), in which all slaves were to be released. Although Jesus’ reading ends with salvation, his audience would know that the passage goes on to announce also judgment. (NIV Cultural Backgrounds Study Bible)

[4] “This geographic area may have been sensitive about premature kingdom claims; Nazareth was just four miles (six kilometers) from the major Galilean city of Sepphoris, which had been destroyed after a revolt against Rome about two decades earlier (AD 6).” (NIV Cultural Backgrounds Study Bible)

[5] Regaining of sight may well mean more than simply miraculously restoring physical sight, which itself pictures a deeper reality (Luke 1:77-7918:35-43). Oppressed may well mean more than simply political or economic oppression, but a deeper reality of oppression by sin (Luke 1:77-7918:35-43). The essence of Jesus’ messianic work is expressed in the phrase to set free. This line from Isa 58 says that Jesus will do what the nation had failed to do. It makes the proclamation messianic, not merely prophetic, because Jesus doesn’t just proclaim the message—he brings the deliverance. “ (NET Bible Commentary)

[6] There is a wordplay here on the word acceptable (δεκτός, dektos), which also occurs in v. 19: Jesus has declared the “acceptable” year of the Lord (here translated year of the Lord’s favor), but he is not “accepted” by the people of his own hometown. (NET Bible Commentary)

[7] “Jesus here highlights their ministry to foreigners (and by implication the resistance of their own people as in v. 24).” (NIV Cultural Backgrounds Study Bible)

[8] Imagine the impact of Jesus’ words on Jewish minds. They placed women, Gentiles, and lepers at the bottom of the social scale. But here the Lord pointedly placed all three above unbelieving Jews! What He was saying was that OT history was about to repeat itself. In spite of His miracles, He would be rejected not only by the city of Nazareth but by the nation of Israel. He would then turn to the Gentiles, just as Elijah and Elisha had done. (Believer’s Bible Commentary)

[9] It is worth noting that it was not Jesus' claim that He was the Messiah that made them angry, but it was His suggestion that their reaction made to His claim made them like one of the worst periods of Israel's history along with the implication that Gentiles might be more helped by God than the nation would be. This is the only place in Luke's Gospel where he uses this term for anger. (Precept Austin)

[10] “They were offended not only that he compared them to the faithless Jews of Elijah and Elisha’s time but also that he suggested that Gentiles could enjoy the blessings of God missed by the Jews—an unthinkable violation of their cultural bias.” (NIV Quest Study Bible Notes)

[11] “Jewish custom suggested hurling a person from a cliff before stoning him, but it forbade execution without trial and would also forbid it on the Sabbath. Roman law forbade executions without the governor’s permission; this group functions like a lynch mob.” (NIV Cultural Backgrounds Study Bible)

[12] “And he could there do no mighty work,.... Or miracle; not that Christ had no power in himself to work miracles, though their unbelief and contempt of him were very great; but it was not fit and proper that he should do any there, since such were their prejudices against him: it is an usual way of speaking with the Hebrews, when either it is not "fit" and proper that a thing should be done, or they "will" not do it, to say it cannot be done; see Genesis 19:22; and even it is said of God himself, "So that the Lord could no longer bear, because of your evil doings", Jeremiah 44:22. Not but that he could if he would, but he would not; nor was it fit and proper that he should; the same is the sense here: besides, in Matthew 13:58 it is said, "he did not many mighty works there"; and so the Arabic version here, "and he did not many mighty works there"; he did not think it proper to do any of any great consequence, nor did he.” (Gill’s Exposition Of The Entire Bible)

[13] Not “weakness of faith,” but “withholding belief in the power and promises of God.” (Thayer’s Greek Lexicon)

[14]  Believer’s Bible Commentary

[15] He once told his disciples. “If any household or town refuses to welcome you or listen to your message, shake its dust from your feet as you leave.” (Matthew 10:14)  He seems to have modeled that for them. It wasn’t as if those in Nazareth had no hope. We know the at least some of Jesus’ siblings eventually recognized him as the Messiah. Jesus’ time on earth was limited, and he intended to go where the soil of people’s hearts was ready for the seed of the gospel.

[16] 2 Corinthians 12:9

[17] “He does not come into our lives to fix what is already right; rather, He heals us from our brokenness and forgives our sin. ‘It is not those who are healthy who need a physician, but those who are sick; I did not come to call the righteous, but sinners.’” (Mark 2:17)  (NASB Charles Stanley Life Principles Study Bible)

[18] HT to Malcolm Muggeridge, as cited at Precept Austin

[19] It’s how The Hunger Games ended. So much hope that revolution would bring about a just new world…and it just replicated the previous government. 

[20] “For judgment I came into this world, so that (Same purpose as here in Lk 4:18) those who do not see may see (Good News), and that those who see may become blind.” (Bad News) Those of the Pharisees who were with Him heard these things and said to Him, “We are not blind too, are we?” Jesus said to them, “If you were blind (I.e., if they recognized their state of spiritual blindness, humbled themselves, and cried out to God to "heal" them) you would have no sin; but since you say, ‘We see,’ (I.e., In a state of total self-deception and steadfast rejection of the "sight giving Gospel") your sin remains. (John 9:39-41) (commentary quoted in Precept Austin)

[21] The year of the Lord’s favor (Grk “the acceptable year of the Lord”) is a description of the Year of Jubilee (Lev 25:10). The year of the total forgiveness of debt is now turned into a metaphor for salvation. (NET Bible Commentary) Jesus reads Isa 61:1 – 2, with an added line from Isa 58:6 (tradition suggests that synagogue readers were allowed to “skip” material when reading the Prophets). Isa 61:1 – 2 probably evokes the Year of Jubilee (Lev 25), in which all slaves were to be released. Although Jesus’ reading ends with salvation, his audience would know that the passage goes on to announce also judgment. (NIV Cultural Backgrounds Study Bible)

Harmony #10: Jesus and the Samaritan Woman (John 4:5-26)

I don't think the first two individuals we see Jesus interact with after He cleanses the temple are random placements of unconnected stories.  There are too many similarities and differences that seem very purposeful. Last week was Nicodemus; this week is the Woman at the Well. (The interlude with John the Baptist in John 3 connects these two stories. When you read it, think of both Nicodemus and the Woman at the Well.)

SIMILARITIES

  • Neither understand “the gift of God”

  • Both stories feature water and the Spirit[1] (the John the Baptizer interlude features water and an explanation of the Spirit)

  • They (and the disciples) are confused about terms (birth/water/bread)

  • Both initially see Jesus as a prophet (believe about rather than believe in)

DIFFERENCES

  • Male vs. female

  • Jewish vs. Samaritan

  • Signs and wonders vs. no signs and wonders

  • Nicodemus leaves confused; she leaves converted

  • He leaves covertly; she leaves loudly and brings people back

 

THE STORY (Bible quoted in italics; commentary in regular font)


Jesus left Judea (where the Pharisees were thick) and set out once more for Galilee. But he had to pass through Samaria, which had long been a place of idol worship combined with worship of Yahweh. Israel’s Jews considered these cousins with Gentile blood and worship to be not just impure, but evil.[2] When traveling between Galilee and Judea, many Jews would cross the Jordan twice rather than pass through Samaria. Jesus headed straight through.

Now Jesus came to a Samaritan town called Sychar (which means, fittingly, “Drunken”).[3] It was near the plot of land that Jacob had given to his son Joseph.[4] Jacob’s well was there, so Jesus, since he was tired from the journey, sat down beside the well. It was about noon. A Samaritan woman came to draw water.

It wasn’t that unusual for people to draw water at this time (you didn’t get peak heat until around 3:00), but it wasn’t typical.  Was it her second trip because she had already used up her morning draw? Did something delay her that morning? Was she trying to avoid people? John doesn’t say why she was there at that time; he just tells us what follows.

We don't know if other people were there or not – the text doesn’t say – it just says that when the Samaritan woman arrived, Jesus asked for her help, which in the Middle East was a gesture that honored her.  Jesus said, “Give me some water to drink.” (For his disciples had gone off into the town to buy supplies.) This was part of the protocol for hospitality, because the one requesting acknowledged a need that the one requested could satisfy.

But the Samarian woman had some questions. She said to him, “How can you—a Jew—ask me, a Samaritan woman, for water to drink?”  (For Jews have no communion with Samaritans.) That’s an understatement. The Jews and Samaritans really didn’t like each other. The Samaritans had intermingled not only their families with hostile nations but also their temples with hostile gods, then had the audacity to desecrate Jewish temples while building their own temple and declaring it to be the true one. They also rejected every part of the Old Testament except the first 5 books. The rabbis had declared everything in Samaria unclean. Some went so far as to declare that if a Samaritan were in a town, all the spittle in that town was to be considered unclean (because it might derive from a Samaritan). To drink from her jar would have made Jesus ritually impure in the eyes of Jesus’ Jewish peers.

The early church writers consistently pointed something else out: she seemed to be concerned that Jesus was about to break Jewish law.[5] If she were as morally corrupt as she is often portrayed –and had the kind of animosity in her that Samaritans and Jews often had for each other - it’s hard to envision she wouldn’t have found it delightful to corrupt this strange Jewish man. But her first response is concern: “Are you sure you should be doing this?” File this away as we think of her….

Jesus answered her, “If you had known the gift of God[6] and who it is who said to you, ‘Give me some water to drink,’ you would have asked him, and he would have given you fresh, flowing water – the water of life.”  The rabbis spoke of Torah, the law, as a gift from God that was as refreshing as living water. But John uses the symbolism differently to refer to God’s own refreshing spirit, the Holy Spirit, that the prophets said would be poured out on all people. Paul will write later in his first letter to the Corinthians that we all drink of the same Spirit (12:13)

“Sir,” the woman respectfully said to him, “you have no bucket and the well is 100 feet deep; where then do you get this living water?  Surely you’re not greater than our ancestor Jacob, are you? For he gave us this well and drank from it himself, along with his sons and his livestock.”  

Jesus didn’t just come out and say, “Why, yes, as a matter of fact, I am better than Jacob.”  He simply describes what He has to offer and lets her decide. He replied, “Everyone who drinks some of this water will be thirsty again. But whoever drinks some of the water that I will give him will never be thirsty again, but the water that I will give him will become in him a fountain of water springing up to eternal life.”

Had the Samaritans used the entire Old Testament, this probably would have sounded familiar to her. Isaiah, for example, wrote (12:3), “With joy you will draw water from the wells of salvation.” Zechariah wrote that living water would come from Jerusalem and cover the world (14:8). But, like I said earlier, the Samaritans only used the first 5 books of the Old Testament. They had nothing from the prophets. In fact, they thought Moses was the last prophet, and they looked forward to the next Moses.

The woman was likely testing this bold claim when she said to him, “Sir, give me this water, so that I will not be thirsty or have to come here to draw water.” Oh, so you can get fresh, running water when there is none in sight? Let’s see it! Does she think he’s bluffing and she’s trying to respectfully end this game? Is she hopeful that there is another, better source of water, maybe closer to home?  Maybe she could be the town hero if she found better water! We don’t know. What we do know is that Jesus pulls a Nicodemus Switcheroo and changes the subject entirely.

Jesus said to her, “Go call your husband and come back here.”  The woman replied, “I have no husband.” Jesus, who had knowledge of her heart (like he did with Nathaniel and Nicodemus), said to her,Right you are when you said, ‘I have no husband,’ for you have had five husbands, and the man you are living with now is not your husband. This you said truthfully.”

Lots of ink has been spilled discussing how immoral this woman was (a serial adulteress? A prostitute?) That’s not at all clear from the text.

  • If she was a known serial adulteress or a prostitute, men would not have kept marrying her (and because the Samaritans had the Law, the penalty would have been death).

  • Perhaps she had been divorced most or all of these times (it was really easy for a man to initiate divorce over even the most minor things, like burning breakfast toast).

  • Perhaps she was repeatedly widowed; if so, others might think that God was set against her because something was wrong with her.

It’s not even clear that she was living in a morally compromised relationship with the man in her life. I mean, maybe she was:

  • She could have been living with a man (which would have been unusual for both of them).

  • Maybe she was living with a man to whom she was betrothed (kind of married in that they had started the covenant process but not married in that they hadn’t finished it?)

  • Maybe she was a concubine (which was allowed). 

  • Maybe a vindictive husband put her away without divorcing her, and she eventually remarried (which would count as adultery).

But maybe, for a variety of reasons, her marriage had not yet been consummated, which was the act of covenant initiation (which no one would know except the woman, her husband, and now Jesus).  Maybe her deceased husband’s brother had married her (#OTlaw) but had never consummated the marriage.

WE DON’T KNOW. A loooooot is read into this text. What we do know is this: Jesus gets to an issue to which she responds with a term of respect, and without a sense of shame or anger. The woman said to him, “Sir, I see that you are a prophet.

Hmmmm. Her spiritual eyes are opening. This is a revelatory moment: someone waiting for the next prophet - who would be an end time Restorer - acknowledges that Jesus – a Jewish man, not a Samaritan - is a prophet. So, what kind of question would you ask a Jewish prophet?  We would expect a petty or small-minded person to ask a petty or small-minded question, probably something like a parlor trick.  She has something on her mind much like Nicodemus: He wanted to make sure he was in the Kingdom; she want’s to know if she is getting her worship right.” Great question, because “zeal for the house of the Lord” consumes prophets.[7]

She continued, Our fathers worshiped on this mountain, Mount Gerizim, which is holy to us (Deut. 11:2927:12). Your people say that the place where people must worship is in Jerusalem, but we Samaritans are unwelcome in Jerusalem’s temple. Who is right? Which temple is the right one? And if it’s the one in Jerusalem, how can I, a Samaritan, worship where I am supposed to worship?

Jesus said to her, “Believe me, my lady,[8] a time is coming when you will worship the Father neither on this mountain nor in Jerusalem. You people worship what you do not know. How could you know? You have rejected the revelation of the prophets after Moses, prophets who revealed so much about Yahweh and His plan for His people and the world. We worship what we know, because it was always God’s plan that the source of salvation would arise from the Jewish people. But a time is coming—and now is here—when the true worshipers will worship the Father in spirit(by the power of the Holy Spirit) with truth[9] about God, which they lack.[10] The Father seeks such people to be his worshipers, identified not by where they worship but whom and how they worship together, as one people united by God. God is spirit, and the people who worship him must worship in spirit and truth.”

The woman said to Jesus, “I know that the Messiah is coming; He will be a restorer, like Moses.[11]He will restore God’s divine favor that ended after Moses. We believe whenever he comes, he will tell us all things.”

Jesus said to her, “It is the I AM who speaks to you.”

 That was a phrase she recognized. That is how God identified himself to their hero, Moses. And I suspect this is where it really sank in that this was not a conversation just about water with just another prophet. This man offered the promised restoration, the return of God’s favor on outcast people and the repairing of the ruins in their temples, their homes, and their hearts.

Now at that very moment his disciples came back. They were shocked because he was speaking with a woman. Not only did traditional Mediterranean culture considered it inappropriate for a woman to talk with unrelated men in unguarded settings but also the Mishnah read, “He that talks much with womankind brings evil upon himself and neglects the study of the Law and at the last will inherit Gehenna.” Yikes.  However, no one said, “What do you want?” or “Why are you speaking with her?” Good call, disciples.

Then the woman, thoroughly distracted from her original mission, left her water jar, went off into the town and said to the people the same thing Phillip had said: “Come and see. There is a man who told me everything I ever did. Surely he can’t be the Messiah, can he?”[12] It would seem Jesus and the woman talked more than is recorded. The text hardly shows that he “told her everything she ever did.” It seems safe to assume that as they talked, Jesus demonstrated that he knew her – which to the Jewish and Samaritan people was something that would characterize the coming Messiah.

So they left the town and began coming to him. This is yet another detail that makes me think the woman was not an infamous as I was raised to believe. Who would believe the report about a spiritual issue (not just about a prophet but about the Messiah Moses promised) from a serial adulteress or a tragically promiscuous person, especially in a culture that did not think women were reliable narrators to begin with? Meanwhile the disciples were urging him, “Rabbi, eat something.” But he said to them, “I have food to eat that you know nothing about.” So the disciples began to say to one another, “No one brought him anything to eat, did they?”

Oh, disciples. The learning curve is long for them. They think of physical food as quickly as the Jewish leaders thought of the physical temple, Nicodemus thought of physical birth, and the Samaritan woman thought of physical water. I’m sensing some patterns here in the storytelling.

Jesus said to them, “My food is to do the will of the one who sent me and to complete his work.[13]Don’t worry about me. You are missing what’s here for you. Don’t you know what the farmers say: ‘There are four more months and then comes the harvest?’ I tell you, look up and see that the fields are already white for harvest! You are in Samaria; they are ready to be brought into the Kingdom.The one who reaps receives pay and gathers fruit for eternal life, so that the one who sows and the one who reaps can rejoice together. For in this instance the saying is true, ‘One sows and another reaps.’  I am setting you up for the joy of reaping a harvest of souls that you did not work for; others, such as all the prophets, have labored before you, an now you have entered into their labor.”

Now many Samaritans from that town believed he was a prophet because of the report of the woman who testified, “He told me everything I ever did.”[14] So when the Samaritans came to him, they began asking him to stay with them. He and his disciples stayed there two days, and because of his word many more believed.

They said to the woman, “No longer do we believe because of your words, for we have heard for ourselves, and we know that this one really is the Savior of the entire world.”  This echoes what John the Baptizer had already said: “God gives the Spirit without limit.” (John 3:34) Jesus promptly demonstrates what he told Nicodemus: God loves and offers salvation to the whole world, even the Samaritans – the ones His people most despised. He goes to them. He accepts their hospitality. He doesn’t worry that others might think he had compromised himself by treating them with dignity. They needed Living Water, and he took it to them.

According to an early tradition, after the Resurrection she was baptized with the name Photini, “the enlightened one.” The story goes that she went with her 7 children to spread the gospel in Carthage, which was in Phonecia on the northern coast of Africa. She was eventually killed (along with her family) by Nero – who had her thrown into a well.[15]

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[1] Is this story actually explaining the “water and Spirit” Jesus just told Nicodemus was needed for a second birth? Hmmmm……

[2] Background info from the commentary accompanying The Voice translation, ESV Reformation Study Bible, NIV Cultural Backgrounds Study Bible, NIV Biblical Theology Study Bible, NIV First Century Study Bible, Orthodox Study Bible, Believer’s Bible Commentary, Expositor’s Bible Commentary, Adam Clarke’s commentary

[3] With this crime the Prophet Isaiah (Isaiah 28:1Isaiah 28:3Isaiah 28:7-8) charges the Ephraimites, within whose limits the city stood. (Adam Clarke)

[4] “This reference to Joseph in verse 5 will only become clear when we see that the Samaritan woman suffered in her life in a manner similar to Joseph. If this reading of the story is correct, than just as in Joseph’s life, unexplained suffering was endured for the purpose of bringing salvation to Israel, so the Samaritan woman’s suffering in her life led to the salvation of the Israelite Samaritans in that locale.” https://sarahbowler.com/2015/01/20/the-woman-at-the-well/

[5] The book series Ancient Christian Commentary on Scripture records numerous early church writers pointing this out.

[6] Language used for the Holy Spirit elsewhere in the New Testament.

[7] This also makes me think the woman should be seen as more than a moral failure. She could have asked a lot of petty or vindictive things of a potential prophet to prove what he knows. She asks a really good question about the temple.

[8] “Woman” is too blunt a translation for our 21st century ears. It sounds rude, when it wasn't. It’s the same way he addressed his own mother in John 2:4.

[9] “In the Spirit and in truth”, or “in spirit and truth.”

[10] “The worship of the Samaritans was a defective worship - they did not receive the prophetical writings: that of the Jews was a carnal worship, dealing only in the letter…with types and ceremonies.” (Adam Clarke) 

[11] Making the water imagery very important, considering Moses’ role as a water-giver.

[12] “The Jews believed that one essential characteristic of the Messiah would be, that he should be able to tell the secrets of all hearts. This they believed was predicted, Isaiah 11:2-3. When the famous impostor Barchochab, who rose up under the empire of Adrian, about a hundred years after the incarnation, professed himself to be the Messiah, after having been deceived by him for two years, they at last thought of putting his divinity to proof on this ground: they brought before him persons whom he did not know, some of whom were very vicious, and others of a different character; they desired him to point out who were the righteous, and who were the wicked; which when he could not do, they rose up and put him to death.” (Adam Clarke)

[13] We are told in this story what spiritual nourishment looks like: our water is the Holy Spirit, our food is doing the will of God.

[14] The Samaritan woman is sometimes referred to as the first apostle because of her evangelism. In a culture where women were considered inherently unreliable had a second-class status to the men around them, this is yet another example of how God uses what is foolishness and weakness to the world to shame the arrogance of the ‘wise’ and ‘strong,’ and taking those who “are not” valuable in the eyes of society and demonstrating their value. (1 Corinthians 1:28-29)

[15] Orthodox Study Bible

Harmony #9: Second Birth (John 2:23-3:21)

John 2:23 During the Passover feast in Jerusalem, the crowds were watching Jesus closely; and many began to trust (affirm/have confidence) in Him because of the signs He was doing. But Jesus saw through to the heart of humankind, and He did not entrust himself (affirm/have confidence) to them. He didn’t need anyone to testify concerning character of humanity. He understood human nature.

Jesus saw that their admiration of his miracles and signs was not the same as faith. They were impressed, but being impressed is not the same as being a follower who truly sees Jesus for who he is. There is belief about and belief in. Even demons believe true things about God.[1] The crowds believed true things about Jesus. We are about to meet Nicodemus, who apparently falls into the category of someone who is impressed – he believes true things about Jesus -  but doesn’t understand truly who Jesus is.

I tend to think that miraculous signs would have been impressive enough to win me over. So why weren’t those miracles overwhelmingly convincing concerning Jesus’ divinity? Miracles were attributed to religious leaders, royalty, and heroes (depending on your culture). Apparently everybody believed in miracle-working; they just weren’t sure where the power came from; some claimed Jesus’ power comes from Satan (see Mark 3:20-30).

It reminds me of my class at Spring Arbor of students who already worked in the medical field. When I gave my presentation on dualism (supernatural and natural worlds exist; there are immaterial realities as well as material ones), they stopped me: “You are preaching to the choir. Anyone who works in a hospital long enough has stories of strange, unexplained things. You don’t have to convince us.”  

So miracles were accepted as a thing to those watching Jesus: either God was ‘with’ someone, or evil was empowering people to do astonishing things. But it didn’t necessarily mean more than that. As one pastor said,

“"Seeing signs and wonders, and being amazed at them, and giving the miracle worker credit for them that he is from God, saves nobody. This is one of the great dangers of signs and wonders: You don’t need a new heart to be amazed at them. The old, fallen human nature is all that’s needed to be amazed at signs and wonders.”[2]

My sense, for what it’s worth, is that Jesus miracles were primarily intended to prove to the Jewish community that He was the messiah foreshadowed in the Old Testament.[3] See my footnotes for how Jesus’ miracles hit all the OT hyperlinks for what a Messiah would do.

Nicodemus was one of the Pharisees[4], a man with some clout among his people. He came to Jesus under the cloak of darkness to question Him.[5] He said, “Rabbi, some of us have been talking. It is generally agreed that you are obviously a teacher who has come from God. The signs You are doing are proof that God is with You.[6]

Once again, Old Testament prophets did signs. Think of Moses turning staffs into snakes, and the plagues, Daniel in the lion’s den, Elijah withheld rain, etc. “God is with you” is respectful to be sure, but it’s not new territory. At this point Jesus totally changes the subject. Remember how “he saw the heart of mankind?” He apparently introduces the true reason Nicodemus is visiting.

Jesus:  I tell you the truth: only someone who experiences birth for a second time[7] can hope to see the kingdom of God.

Last week, when I was downstate doing some teaching for a gig involving youth, I had a long conversation after a session with a student. It took 40 minutes until we finally got to the heart of the issue. All the discussion was good, but every 10 minutes or so she would say something that would make me think, “Oh. We aren’t talking about the real issue yet.” But we got there. Jesus didn’t need 40 minutes. That’s one of the perks of being God in the flesh. He just went there.

Nicodemus: “Well, we’ve seen your signs and heard you teach, and we pretty much agree you are a teacher with God’s power behind him.” Jesus: “There’s no way you are going to see the Kingdom of God in the state you are in.”  Apparently, Nicodemus really wanted to be a part of the Kingdom of God. Kudos to Nicodemus. This guy is going out of his way to talk with Jesus because this is a big deal to him. So, it’s helpful to know how Nicodemus had been raised to believe one got into the Kingdom of God.

"Nicodemus would have stressed the careful observance of the Law and the traditions of the elders. [but it is] not a devout regard for the Law, not even a revised presentation of Judaism [that] is required, but a radical rebirth. The demand is repeated three times. Nicodemus and all his tribe of lawdoers are left with not the slightest doubt but that what is asked of anyone is not more law, but the power of God within that person to remake him or her completely. In its own way this chapter does away with “works of the law” every bit as thoroughly as anything in Paul."[8]

This had to be a spiritual earthquake. Nicodemus has been dedicating his life to doing all the right things to the best of his ability. Later, when Jesus starts rebuking the Pharisees point by point, we will see they were dedicated to getting even the smallest of things right. Jesus says, “No, the problem is that you aren’t the kind of person who can do this. The solution is so radical that it’s going to be like you started your whole life over and got born again.”

Nicodemus: I am a grown man. How can someone be born again when he is old like me? Am I to crawl back into my mother’s womb for a second birth? That’s impossible! 

The Jewish people believed in people being regenerated when people converted to Judaism; they even referred to it having a new birth. I suspect the idea wasn’t the problem so much as the fact that Nicodemus had already been ‘born again’ into Judaism. That ground had been covered. This really limited his options as he considered that he would have to be born again, again. 

Jesus:  I tell you the truth, if people not experience water and Spirit birth,[9] there’s no chance they will make it into God’s kingdom.

This likely refers to Old Testament passages in which “water” and “Spirit” describe the pouring out of God’s Spirit in the end times (Is. 32:1544:3Ezek. 36:25–27). It’s a hyperlink to a “cleansing and transformation” that involves becoming a new kind of person, not just a cleaned up one. (See my footnotes for more details.)

When my computer gets old enough, it can’t do what it’s supposed to do because the programs are becoming obsolete. I can add patches; I can load all kinds of upgrades; I can get it refurbished. But eventually, it’s not going to run the programs it was intended to run and that I need to run. Shoot, I can’t find chargers that match, and it can’t interact with other computers because none of the connectors work.  I need a new computer.

Nicodemus was patching and upgrading relentlessly. He wanted to function as Yahweh intended: There is no reason to doubt that he wanted to love God and love his neighbors as God intended. But He needed to be new. So Jesus explains what he needs in order to be new.

Like comes from like. Whatever is born from flesh is flesh; whatever is born from Spirit is spirit. Don’t be shocked by My words, but I tell you the truth. Even you, an educated and respected man among your people, must be reborn by the Spirit to enter the kingdom of God.[10]

“Like comes from like” just means that things give birth to other things that are like themselves. If you are fleshy, you give birth to fleshy things, and they will be like you. The line continues. Obviously Nicodemus knows this. But Jesus introduces a different line of succession for those who will enter His kingdom: It’s not the fleshy descendants of Abraham; it’s the spiritual children of God. God’s people need to be new: they need a new spirit, and that has to be birthed from a spiritual place, not a physical place.  

The wind blows all around us as if it has a will of its own; we feel and hear it; we do not understand where it has come from or where it will end up, [yet we see its impact, so we know it is real.]

So far, so good. Earthly analogy. The wind is less mysterious to us than it was to them #science, but try to imagine life before Doppler radar and satellites. Wind is crazy, and that area was known for really crazy winds. Sudden storms on the Sea of Galilee were a frightening thing. If you sail on the Great Lakes, you know how it is. The weather turns on a dime. I was fishing in my kayak a couple weeks on just a small lake, and a wind came up that sent me and couple others scurrying to shore. I don't understand how wind works, but, yeah, it’s real.

Life in the Spirit is as if it were the wind of God.[11] [It moves on a will of its own; we hear it, but don’t understand how it all works; we don’t know where it will end up, but we feel it. We see its impact, and we know that it is real.]

So, this is what Nicodemus is going to need. Something out of his power to earn or control or even understand. I was talking with Gary Hambleton this week about his heart procedure. He was trying to explain it, but how exactly they are going to make him feel like new is mysterious to us non-heart doctors. Gary and I can talk about diet, exercise, other things in the control of us heart patients. But the Surgeon knows stuff we don’t, and from our perspective, moves in mysterious ways, his medical wonders to perform.

Nicodemus’ righteousness – his fitness for the Kingdom of God – had been earned, controlled and understood up to that point. Now, Nicodemus was going to have to be reborn as a man who surrendered himself to a Holy Spirit that has a will of its own. He won’t know how it works; he won’t know where it will end, but he will feel its power and presence. AND IT WILL MAKE HIM NEW.

Nicodemus:  I still do not understand how this can be. 

Jesus:  Your responsibility is to instruct Israel in matters of faith, but you do not comprehend the necessity of life in the Spirit?  I tell you the truth: we speak about the things we know (zing!), and we give evidence about the things we have seen, and you choose to reject the truth of our witness.  If you do not believe when I talk to you about ordinary, earthly realities [which we have both experienced], then heavenly realities will certainly elude you.[12]  [To speak of heavenly realities with authority, one needs to have been there.] But no one has ever journeyed to heaven above except the One who has come down from heaven—the Son of Man, who is of heaven.[13]

Consider this: to be perfectly acquainted with a place, it is necessary for a person to have been at that place. A lived experience beats a theoretical experience every time. I’ve watched a show called Somebody Feed Phil, and I’ve spent an hour watching him eat and talk in cities around the world. That doesn’t mean I know the city. Phil spent days there. He knows the city better than I do, but he doesn’t know the city. It’s the people who live there who know the city.  Jesus knows Heaven. It’s worth listening to the only One who has lived there tell us about it.

Moses lifted up the serpent in the wilderness. In the same way, the Son of Man must be lifted up; then all those who believe in Him will experience everlasting life.[14]

Through the ‘lifted up’ serpent, the dying were restored by fixing their eyes on it.  When Jesus would be lifted up #crucifixion, those looking to Him, though dying in sin, would be healed and saved.

For God expressed His love for the world[15] in this way: He gave His only Son so that whoever believes in Him will not face everlasting destruction, but will have everlasting life. God didn’t send His Son into the world to judge it;[16] instead, He is here to rescue a world headed toward certain destruction,[17] so that through Him it might be saved.[18]

A summary of the gospel (“good news”) paraphrased from Adam Clarke:

  • The world was in a ruinous, condemned state; people were without power to rescue themselves or the world from destruction.

  • God, motivated by His eternal love, provided for its rescue and salvation, by giving Himself (through his Son) to pay the penalty He set for those who contribute to the ruination of the world, themselves and others.

  • Sin must be a serious evil, when it required no less a sacrifice, to make atonement for it, than God manifested in the flesh to die on behalf of those who brought sinful ruin.

  • One is saved through this sacrifice when one believes that the atoning sacrifice of Jesus indeed accomplished this purpose (affirms, has confidence in, trusts and obeys so that it transforms our lives).

  • Those who believe are exempted from the judgment of eternal death (that they may not perish) and enter into a new life that begins now and ends in eternal glory (that they may have everlasting life).

 No one who entrusts themselves to Him has to fear being brought to judgment (a trial the separates the grain from the chaff), yet that judgment has already happened for everyone who refuses to trust because they reject the name (the person) of the only Son of God.  What is this judgment? The Light sent from God, Jesus, pierced through the world’s blinding darkness of sinful, pain-filled deeds. Still some people loved the darkness over the light because their intentions and actions were evil.  Those who do evil things hate the light and will not come to the light, because they do not want their evil deeds to be seen for what they are.   Those who abandon deceit and act on what is true, they will enter into the light where it will be clear that all their deeds come from God.[19]

 People loved (agapao) the darkness rather than the light. They give themselves sacrificially for the sake of the sin. The immediate judgment seems to be living in darkness: living in the corrosiveness of evil deeds, not just giving in to but embracing the self-destruction that follows sin.

Then, this story bookends nicely.

  • Nicodemus started with, “By your deeds, it’s obvious you come from God,“ and ends with Jesus saying, “When you are in the light, it will be clear that your deeds come from God.”

  • Nicodemus started with, “I am doing the works of the Kingdom to be a member of the Kingdom”; Jesus flips it: “Enter the Kingdom so that you can do the works of the Kingdom.”

And it begins with entrusting ourselves to Jesus. It begins with believing, leaning on, following in the footsteps of, and giving our lives sacrificially to the love of God and others, made possible through the work of Jesus and the renewal of the Holy Spirit.
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[1] James 2:19

[2] “It’s precarious to be a sign-seeker, to crave the spectacular and follow the latest sign worker, until he leaves his wife or buys a new jet with everybody’s money.” #trueevents https://www.desiringgod.org/messages/he-knew-what-was-in-man

[3] The previous several paragraphs were informed by this article: “Making Disciples by Performing Miracles: A Study in Mark, ”Jonathan Rivett Robinson.

 https://hail.to/laidlaw-college/article/k1J3D96. This long quote is worthwhile:  “It is the Jewish scriptures rather than Greco-Roman literature which provide the strongest parallels for Jesus’ miracles. In Jesus’ public miracles he is revealed as God’s agent; the healer and deliverer of Israel. Like Elijah and Elisha, he heals the sick and restores dead children to their parents (Mark 5:21-43; cf. 1 Kgs 17:17-24; 2 Kgs 4:8-37). Like David, he delivers from evil spirits and defeats demonic legions (Mark 5:1-20; cf. 1 Sam 16-18). Like Moses, the hungry people of God are fed in the wilderness (Mark 6:30-44; cf. Num 11). However, those miracles witnessed only by his disciples expand these scriptural Christological insights further. Only the disciples see how the wind and waves obey him and how he walks upon the water as if it were the dry land (Mark 4:35-41; 6:45-52). These two sea miracles serve to identify Jesus with YHWH who calms the storm in Jonah 1 and who walks on the sea in Job 9:8 (LXX).”

[4] “At this time, Israel’s Roman occupiers have given a small group of Sadducees and Pharisees limited powers to rule, and Nicodemus is one of the Pharisees. He holds a seat on the ruling council known as the Sanhedrin.” (commentary from The Voice translation)

[5] Adam Clarke believes this was because Jesus was alone at night.

[6] Jesus’ signs are the conversation starter but not a trigger for faith (v. 2).  (NIV Biblical Theology Study Bible)

[7] The translation “born from above” accords well with the discussion of “earthly” and “heavenly” things in v. 12, and the discussion of ascending and descending in v. 13. This is the meaning of the Greek adverb in other places in this Gospel (19:1123). Nicodemus apparently understood it to mean “a second time.” It is possible that both meanings are intended—a new birth that is a birth from above. (ESV Reformation Study Bible)

[8] Leon Morris, at Precept Austin

[9] Probably the statement refers to Old Testament passages in which the terms “water” and “Spirit” are linked to express the pouring out of God’s Spirit in the end times (Is. 32:1544:3Ezek. 36:25–27). The presence of such rich Old Testament imagery accounts for Jesus’ reproof of Nicodemus (v. 10): as a “teacher of Israel,” he should have understood. (ESV Reformation Study Bible)  “The most plausible interpretation of “born of water and the Spirit” is the purifying and transforming new birth. Since Jesus expects Nicodemus to understand what he means (vv. 710), the background to the concept is previous Scripture. Water in the OT often refers to renewal or cleansing, and the most significant OT connection bringing together water and spirit is Ezek 36:25–27, where water cleanses from impurity and the Spirit transforms hearts. So “born of water and the Spirit” signals a new birth that cleanses and transforms.” (NIV Biblical Theology Study Bible)

[10] By water and the Spirit (in this place)…is probably an elliptical form of speech, for the Holy Spirit under the similitude of water; as, in Matthew 3:3the Holy Ghost and fire, do not mean two things, but one, viz. the Holy Ghost under the similitude of fire-pervading every part, refining and purifying the whole. (Adam Clarke)

[11] Both in Hebrew and in Greek, the “sound” of the “wind” can also mean the “voice” of the “Spirit.” (NIV Cultural Backgrounds Study Bible)

[12] Nicodemus should be able to recognize Jesus’ point, which draws on a familiar principle. Some Jewish people already recognized that humans, with limited knowledge even of earthly things, could not understand the heavens (noted in the widely circulated Wisdom of Solomon 9:16) — at least not without the Spirit sent from above (Wisdom of Solomon 9:17). In John, “earthly” analogies for “heavenly things” here might refer to “above” (see NIV text note on v. 3), “water” (v. 5) and “wind” (v. 8). (NIV Cultural Backgrounds Study Bible)

[13] “But our Lord probably spoke to correct a false notion among the Jews, viz. that Moses had ascended to heaven, in order to get the law. It is not Moses who is to be heard now, but Jesus: Moses did not ascend to heaven; but the Son of man is come down from heaven to reveal the Divine will.” (Adam Clarke)

[14] Just as the image of a serpent was the weapon that destroyed the power of the serpents, so the instrument of Christ's death becomes the weapon that overthrows death. (Orthodox Study Bible)

[15] “The whole human race: This would be a revelation to the exclusive Pharisee, brought up to believe that God loved only the chosen people.”  (Cambridge Bible For Schools And Colleges) 

[16] “Since there are sinners in the world Christ’s coming involves a separation of them from the good, a judgment, a sentence: but this is not the purpose of His coming; the purpose is salvation.” (Cambridge Bible For Schools And Colleges)

[17] The world was under threat of judgment before He came; with His coming salvation became a reality offered to a hostile world (Matt. 23:37Rom. 5:8). (ESV Reformation Study Bible)

[18] Note the change from ‘to save the world,’ to ‘that the world might be saved through Him.’ The world can reject Him if it pleases. (Cambridge Bible For Schools And Colleges)

[19] Jesus speaks of “doing” the truth. This indicates that “truth” is a matter of both thought and practice.