In this sermon, the preacher emphasizes that the book of Genesis is not just a historical account, but a story of God's redemption. He highlights the creation of man in Genesis 1 and 2, the fall of man in Genesis 3, and how God begins to speak of the virgin birth of the Messiah in chapter 3. The preacher also discusses how some people may have a deep knowledge of the Bible but miss the central message of Jesus as the Messiah. He points out that the scene at the pool in John 5, where the first person to enter the water is rewarded, goes against Jesus' teachings of grace and selflessness. The preacher concludes by emphasizing the importance of stepping out in faith and trusting in God's promises.

On Sunday night, we're studying through the Bible from Genesis to Revelation and currently in the Gospel according to John. And we left off with the second miracle of Jesus in John's Gospel, the healing of the nobleman's son. And chapter 5 picks up with his third miracle, 3 of 8, that are recorded in the Gospel according to John and recorded for the purpose that everyone who reads this Gospel would come to the conclusion that Jesus is the Messiah, the Son of God, and thus believe in him unto salvation. Now this, after this, that incident of the healing of the nobleman's son, there was a feast of the Jews. And we don't know which of the three major feasts it was. John doesn't identify it here, but it was during one of these feasts that Jesus went up to Jerusalem. What it does tell us about Jerusalem is that the place would have been wall-to-wall people. Again, Josephus estimating, speaking concerning the Jewish population that would come from all over the area of Israel, literally from all over the world at the time of the feast, would be between 1 and 2 to 3 million people, converging on what was a very, very small city by today's standards. So you've got a huge group of pilgrims now just jamming Jerusalem. And there is, in Jerusalem, by the Sheep Gate, a pool. Now the Sheep Gate there in Jerusalem, evidently the gate by which the priests would, or those that were working related to the priests, bringing the sheep in for sacrifice during the time of the feast, they'd be brought through that gate. But there by the Sheep Gate, there was a pool, which is called in Hebrew Bethesda, having five porches. And the term Bethesda means a house of mercy or a house of pity. John tells us a little bit about it in terms of its architecture. It was a place, it was a large pool there in Jerusalem. There were five porches, five places to get out of the elements and to get out of the heat in the summer is as important in Israel as to get out of the rain in the winter. And so here is this, the pool described in the shelter around the pool. Now, those of you have been to Israel, this is the area by St. Ann's Church there, where you always go in and sing that, you know, in there. And then we come outside, that's the excavation. And they know exactly where they've excavated this site, exactly where the pools are and everything as it's set here in Jesus's time. And so having described and given the name of the site and of the pool, it's distinctive of five porches. This is the population that found itself under those five porches and around that pool. In these lay a great multitude in the ideas like wall to wall, a great multitude of sick people, blind, lame, paralyzed, waiting for the moving of the water. And so you've got a multitude of just the need of humanity, all just crammed wall to wall in this place, every kind of imaginable need as it's described here. Now, they all had, for the diversity of their diseases or the physical limitations, they had a common denominator. And the common denominator was they all had the same hope in that setting. And the hope was they were waiting for the moving of the water for an angel went down at a certain time into the pool, stirred up the water. And then at the stirring of the water, whoever stepped in first after the stirring of the water was made well of whatever disease he had. That's what they were waiting for. Now, it's interesting. Anywhere there is a rumor of healing for diseases that are this desperate, deemed incurable by man, you're going to get a desperate crowd there and you're going to get a crowd because what do you have to lose? And so desperate crowds can, you know, really, you can really manipulate them. You can, you can do a lot of things to a desperate group of people go there, but here they are. And this is the hope that they have. Now I am personally inclined to believe, and you don't have to agree with me. I am personally inclined to believe that the apostle John is merely recounting for us the belief of the people around the pool and not God's actual involvement in the moving of the water. I don't think God was associated with the, whatever healings might've occurred in that pool or were reported to have occurred. And I don't believe he was a part of the whole scene for a couple of reasons. It doesn't look anything like the God that we know anywhere else in the scriptures. It is a scene that has developed the highest level of competition in the heart of one human being against other human beings in the same need. So you have this great kind of competition with my fellow man for what is believed to be some, you know, scant manifestation of God's power. It is also a scene that not only develops a me first attitude, because you'd notice that there, whoever steps in first, it not only develops a me first attitude, it rewards it. This flies in the face of all of Jesus' teaching. It's also a scene that's based upon works versus grace. You get rewarded by God by, by being first. It's also a scene where the strongest are rewarded and, and the weakest are left without God's touch. And I think most powerfully as it relates to what, what I would contend concerning that is that when Jesus comes on the scene, he completely ignores the pool and he has come on the scene to do the father's will, not only the scene of the pool, the scene of planet earth. And when he comes on that scene, he reveals to us the father's heart and the father's activity in the middle of that mass of needy humanity. And you can imagine how that place smelt. I mean, just what a desperate, desperate scene that it would have been. So when Jesus comes on the scene, he doesn't honor the pool deal in any kind of, of a way at all. And if the stirring of the water was the father's gig, then Jesus would have been a part of it, but he's not a part of it at all. And what does Jesus do on the scene? He does what he continually does through the scriptures. And that is, he goes to the person with the greatest need at the scene. Now that looks like the father and that's consistent with Jesus. Remember the man had the withered hand and they put him with it armed there and they put him in the synagogue as a trap to see whether Jesus would heal him on the Sabbath day and all. Jesus walks into that room, into that synagogue, and the first person he notices is the person with the greatest need, the man with the withered hand. And then he addresses it. He heals him on the Sabbath day. I don't want to go into all of that, but that's what he does. He comes into the room where the greatest need gets his attention. I remember when I was in the Calvary Chapel in Napa and we were before the services. We would do a little devotional study with one another. We're getting ready for the day and God's people coming and all of these things. And the first lesson they ever is that you go ahead and do the devotional on this Sunday. And I taught on that man that was in that synagogue. Jesus looking at the greatest need. And just for us to be sharp there as the people are coming now, let's keep our eyes on the greatest need in the room. And it's a comfort for you tonight. If you're here tonight and you have the greatest need, because the Lord's going to meet your need. And then the neat thing about that is then somebody else now has the greatest need. And I teach long enough for God to work the whole room. Yeah, you laugh now. And so he goes over to that scene. And now in verse five, there was a certain man who was there who had an infirmity 38 years. He has been in the middle of this mess with this infirmity 38 years. That's six or seven years longer than Jesus has been alive in his incarnation. 38 years, those of you who are 38 or older, that's a long time, isn't it? That's a long time to be in that kind of a condition. And so he's been in this condition for 38 years. He's a picture of hopelessness. If you haven't gotten to the pool first in 38 years, you're not getting to the pool first. If you couldn't muscle your way in when you were 18 and you were a young buck, you're not going to do it when you add 38 years to 18. You're a dead duck on that scene. You're never going to get healed. You have no hope in the middle of that mass of humanity. Not if that's the way that God works here. So he is a hopeless man in the thick of a hopeless people. And nothing's hopeless as long as God is alive. There's no beginning and no end. So that's always going to be the case. And when Jesus saw him lying there, he knew that he had already been in that condition a long time. And Jesus said to him, do you want to be made? Well, that's the question that Jesus says. I think it's an interesting one there in verse six. Do you want to be made? Well, I've listened to teaching on this and they said, I mean, what kind of an obvious question is this? You know, he wants to be made. Well, you know, and the whole thing, that's the, miss the point entirely. Jesus comes in and he says, do you want to be made? Well, and the question seems like a needless one. Of course, the man wants to be made. Well, but the fact of the matter is in this life, not everyone wants to be made. Well, that's the way that it is through the years. I have met homeless people, street people here in Modesto who are not interested one bit in changing or being made. Well, that does not characterize all homeless people or all street people, but it does some of them that I have met. They like their life just fine. They don't want to work. They don't want to be disciplined in their life. They don't want positions of responsibility in their life. They're completely happy with the way that they are. And you can have all of the means necessary. And we have those means as a church, you can have all of the means necessary to help them become responsible citizens. And some of them are not interested and you can't help them if they're not interested because they have to at least bring in the words of the question, the want to, to the table. So Jesus asked him, do you want to be made? Well, you've got to at least bring that to the table. Anyone can bring that to the table. Now the man's answer is an interesting one. The sick man answered Jesus and said, sir, I have no man to put me into the pool when the water is stirred up. But while I'm coming another steps down before me. Now he is intending to answer Jesus's question. He's intending to answer it, but it's not an answer, but this man does. And it is fascinating to me. He answers a question that Jesus didn't ask him. His answer goes with a different question. And this is the question. Why haven't you been made? Well, but Jesus did not ask him why you haven't been made. Well, Jesus asked him, do you want to be made? Well, that's the question that, that, that he asked there. And I'll tell you the tendency, even for those of us who are Christians to complicate things. One of the things that they tell pastors is, you know, you need to answer questions that people are asking. And so find out what people are asking and then answer those questions. And sometimes though in the body of Christ, we're answering questions that God isn't asking. He'll need to know the whole story about why I've been here for 38 years and why I didn't get to the water first. And of course, it's always because other people haven't helped me as much as I needed it. And other people get the help, but I don't get the help. And so we're going to explain to him all of the reasons why, and my background and this happened to me, all of these different things. And on God says, listen, I never asked you how you got in this condition. I know how you got in this condition. I have a simple question for you. Do you want to be made well from the condition that you're in? I am a great complicator of things. God works very hard to keep things simple. And so he begins to talk about, I haven't had the help and all, and perhaps in his heart, he's thinking, all right, I've got, you know, someone looks like he's in his mid thirties that can probably help me get to that pool, you know, at the right time. And you're going to think that that's the best that Jesus is going to be able to do for him. However inadequate his answer is here, Jesus recognizes a want to in it. And Jesus says in verse eight, because he's so gracious with this man, with me, with you. Jesus said to him, rise, take up your bed and walk. Rise, take up your bed and walk. Now it wasn't a bed. We have beds here that, you know, you've envisioned some kind of a bunk bed or something out of pottery barn or something that he's got set up there with, you know, some shabby chic thing that he's kind of worked into the corner there, one of the porches and all. His bed was a mat. It was just a pad. And it's a scene that is played over and over and over again in Jesus's contact with a needy man who Jesus loves. Jesus gives the command now to do these things, something that is impossible for him to do in his own strength. But if he will just obey the command, he will discover that God always couples with his commands, the ability to obey the command always does it. Do you think that he's going to say, rise, take up your bed and walk and then watch the guy try and get up and fumble and fall down? And we say that's ridiculous. That's a blasphemous thought concerning the Lord. Then why do we think that that's what he's doing behind his commands sometime in our lives? Because we can read the volume of the book as rise, take up your bed and walk. And we look at the command that God gives in terms of putting off and putting on or not doing and doing this and all of these things. And we say, you don't know my story. You don't know what I've been through. You don't know what I've seen in all of these things. I got to lay all these things out and I can't be like everyone else. And I haven't had the help that everyone else has. And I know this works for everybody else and all. And it doesn't for me. And God will never have one of us step out on one of his promises and ever be embarrassed for having done so. And it's the moment of truth. I have known it is to me the great difference between those that I have seen over the years in the body of Christ. Exhibit wholeness and moving forward and fruitfulness for the kingdom of God and those who don't. It is those who look at his word, acknowledge that it is a living word, step out on that word, discover his power there and continue in a life of that. And the other group never moves. And it's heartbreaking. Because this is a scene, you know, here's a scene that's a physical one. It can be a moral one. It can be a whatever kind of one, certainly a spiritual one. The Lord wants us. He wants this man out of that scene. He wants us out of these scenes. But there is that moment of truth where what has whatever has been my history for 38 years is here and God's command is here. And I'm going to believe one of them or the other. And if I'll believe God's word and step out in it, I will discover his word to be the truth about the situation. The healing always comes and immediately the man was made well, took up his bed and he walked. What a scene. Rolls up his bed, I'm out of here. But Jesus made two very big mistakes. He did this on the Sabbath day. Two mistakes. Number one, he healed someone on the Sabbath day. For those of you who are new here, I'm not saying he made a mistake. He made a mistake in the eyes of the religious leaders. But first of all, is he healed on the Sabbath day in violation of their interpretation of the law? And then the second thing he did is not only heal the guy, but he told him to take up his bed and carry that man on out of here. You're through with this scene. And he caused the man to carry a burden on the Sabbath day. Imagine Jesus just acting like God and everything there in that scene, you know, and being so comfortable with it. The Jews said to him who was cured. Now here's a guy. He has been lame, unable to walk for 38 years. They see him walking with his tab. He is not a part of the pilgrimage crowd. He's one of the guys that's there all the time. These religious leaders knew these guys. What are you doing? You're going on 38 years, aren't you down there? And here they see him coming, and he is walking, and he is carrying his bed. And the reaction of any kind of compassionate person, religious or otherwise, would be, you're walking! How does it feel after 38 years? Was it like riding a bike? Did it come back pretty quick to you? Well, I'm so excited for you, you know. Let me carry your bed for you, you know. And I mean, there were just normally there'd be that kind of an excitement. But these guys, they have lost, completely lost, and it's lost, and I'm not even finishing my sentences. I'm so excited about it. They have completely lost contact with reality. And it can happen sometimes in religious circles with just, man, you're so far out there, you don't know what's going on, and the normal emotions of a human being. And so they see him coming, and they said, it's the Sabbath, it's not lawful for you to carry your bed. What a reaction. And he answered them, and he said, he who made me well, said to me, take up your bed and walk. I am just obeying the one who healed me. The one who told me to arise and walk also told me to take up my bed and walk. You had 38 years to do something for me. You did nothing for me. And so I am going to obey the one that not only gave me the command, but then healed me as I obeyed the command. But the one who was healed did not know. Oh, excuse me, verse 12. And they asked, who is the man who said, do you take up your bed and walk? And the man who was healed, he didn't know who Jesus was. They knew nothing of Jesus. Jesus just comes on the scene, for Jesus had withdrawn a multitude being in that place. So crowded during the feast days, Jesus healed them, and they just simply disappeared. And afterward, Jesus found him in the temple. Now that is a good place to start a new life. He's going to go where he can worship God and thank God for what he knew God had done for him. Only God can heal like that. Only God can heal. And so he goes into the temple and Jesus finds him in the temple. And he said to him, see, you've been made well. I like that. You've been made well, haven't you? No psychosomatic thing involved in that, is it? It's a real deal. You really got healed, didn't you? You're a really healed person. And I love it as it relates to our own Christianity. I mean, for those of you who've walked with the Lord and all, and to look at your life, you know that it wasn't some kind of a phase or some mind over matter thing that's an explanation for the difference in your life. God did something real in our lives, changing us. So he said, see, you've been made well. And then he said, sin no more, lest a worse thing come upon you. Now, this man evidently was in that infirm condition of because of sin. Now, not everyone is sick because of sin or has an infirmity because of sin, but we do know that there are consequences to sin. Alcoholism has physical consequences to it. Drug abuse has physical consequences to it. Sexual immorality, there's consequences to it. Whatever it might be, the sin, there's always a consequence to these things. And so he had borne the consequences of whatever it is that he was engaged in. It resulted in an infirmed life here. And Jesus said, sin no more, lest a worse thing come upon you. I love that phrase, sin no more. I like the strength of it. You notice Jesus doesn't come and say, now sin as little as possible. Now, I know for a fact on the teaching of the scriptures, that every one of us try as hard as we might, we will sin every day, should not be willful sin. But since perfection is the standard, Jesus is the standard, then we are going to, in some way in the course of the day, be less than Jesus in our actions, in our words, in our thoughts, in our motives, not only in the things that we do, but the things that Jesus would have done, but we didn't do in the course of a day. Sin of omission. And so there is that realization that until we're in heaven's glory, we're always going to fall short in this life. But it should never, that realization that keeps me out of condemnation, should never keep me from growing in holiness. And Jesus is coming to this man and saying, I want you to treat holiness as a precious thing. And he raises that standard. Don't make the standard today, I'm going to sin as little as possible. Make the standard, sin no more. Go into life, go into a day with as high a standard as it can be. Jesus speaks to this man and as he's healed the man, he doesn't want the man just to think that, oh, well, you know, this is easy come, easy go. God can always do this for me again if I go back into sin and all of these different kinds of things. And he doesn't want this man to misunderstand his healing in his life as minimizing the seriousness of sin. And he's telling this man, don't assume that there will be a miraculous healing again if you go back to the old ways. Treat what God has done for you in a changed life as the precious thing that it is and protect it. And if you do that, then you won't need a second healing as it relates to these things. So I'm not to presume on or sin against God's grace. Paul wrote to the Romans and he said, what shall we say then? Shall we continue in sin that grace may abound? He said, certainly not. How shall we who died to sin live any longer in it? And so he speaks to this man, says, don't go back there. Don't go back there. It's as bad and worse as when you left it. And what happened to you before physically will happen to you again. The man departed and then told the Jews that it was Jesus who made him well. So a public testimony of Jesus. It was Jesus. He's excited. I know who it was. It was Jesus. And for this reason, the Jews persecuted Jesus and sought to kill him because he had done these things on the Sabbath day, a purely rational reaction to what Jesus had done there. And they want to kill him. They're just not a little steamed. They want to kill him because he had done these things on the Sabbath day. But the thing is, is that God gets to do whatever he wants to do on the Sabbath day. As Jesus declared in Mark chapter two, the Sabbath was made for man, not man for the Sabbath. Therefore, the son of man is also Lord of the Sabbath. God gets to do what he wants on the Sabbath, but he knows to be his limitations or what he knows to be his right to do on a Sabbath. God doesn't feel constrained by their interpretations related to the Sabbath. And Jesus is the son of God. Didn't in God, the son didn't feel constrained either, but they're pretty steamed about all of this. And so Jesus wants to have a conversation with them. And so he begins to address these religious leaders in verse 17. And Jesus answered them. My father has been working until now, and I have been working. Now, what Jesus does now is he now addresses the things that these religious leaders should have learned about him or understood about him on the basis of this miracle and others. But things that they refused to learn, Jesus is going to just spell it out for them. They should have understood what this miracle was revealing about him. And so he says, my father has been working until now, and I have been working. And what he's doing here is he's declaring himself equal with the father. Equal in authority over nature. He's saying what I just did in the healing of this lame man for 38 years, I did in perfect harmony with the father. Now, these religious leaders are going to oppose Jesus because they think that Jesus is doing something contrary to the father, their understanding of the father, which is a misunderstanding. So they see Jesus and the father working out of harmony with one another. He comes in. Jesus says, listen, what I just did here now, I did in harmony with the father. He works on the Sabbath. I work on the Sabbath. Wouldn't it be terrible if God took a Sabbath off? Wouldn't it be terrible if God took a day off? He holds your very breath. Be a bad day, wouldn't it? He'd only take one day off and you'd all be dead. Me too. Jesus holds the entirety of the universe together. By him, all things consist. He takes a day off and these guys don't have to worry about nothing. There's nothing to worry about. There's nothing left. These are funny things to me, you know, in all of this. So they're thinking, you know, what you're doing is in violation of what the father has taught and what the father would do. And he said, we've both been working. We were both at work in the healing of this lame man. Now you put your name in what Jesus said in verse 17 and it's a farce. My father's been working until now. And I, and Damien Kyle's been working too, at the healing of a man lame for 38 years. Sure was a father, but I was in. Because nonsensical, doesn't it? Because I'm not equal with the father. And they understood that he was making himself equal with the father. Verse 18. Therefore, the Jews sought all the more to kill him because he not only broke the Sabbath, their interpretations, but also said that God was his father making himself equal with God. Now, this is an interesting verse as it relates to the Jehovah witnesses who claim that Jesus never declared concerning himself that he was divine. He never ascribed deity to himself. That is the contention of the Jehovah witness. And yet here you have a statement that he makes. It is an all Jewish confab that's going on here. They understand exactly what Jesus is saying to them. And Jesus knows that they are understanding it. He is making himself equal with the father. They got it. And so they're upset now because he's made himself equal with God. And then Jesus answered and said to them, most assuredly, I say to you, the son can do nothing of himself, but what he sees the father do for whatever he, the father does. The son also does in like manner for the father loves the son and shows him all things that he himself does. And he will show him greater works than these that you may marvel. And so in verse 19, Jesus again declares that what he was doing in complete harmony with the father, oneness with the father. And then in verse 19, he declares that the father loves the son. Why? Because these religious leaders claim to love the father, but they hated the son. And so Jesus is telling them, you're, you're missing this. The father loves the son. And again, and he shows him all things that he himself does. And he will show him greater works than these that you may marvel for as the father raises the dead and gives life to them. Even so the son gives life to whom he will now inject your name in there again, becomes nonsensical again. So here he is. He's claiming equality with the father. He is claiming that all that he is doing and has done is in perfect harmony with the father. And so, uh, Jesus, the father raises the dead. Jesus raised the dead. He would raise the dead in the course of his public ministry. We get to John chapter 11. There's a raising of Lazarus from the dead. And then in verse 22 for the father judges, no one, but has committed all judgment to the son that all should honor the son, just as they honor the father. He who does not honor the son does not honor the father who sent him. There's the repetition of the word honor. Isn't there in conjunction with what the fact that Jesus is the judge. Then this culture, what happens when you're in a courtroom, what do you call the judge? Your honor. Why? Because whoever has the position of judgment, you want them happy with you. You show them respect was interesting. Wasn't it? M and M's recent trial. Here's this rapper, you know, this bad boy, this blah, blah, blah, and all this thing and everything. And he gets this weapon charge and he goes in there and you know, puffy comb, same thing. And they end up in court, but M and M ends up in court and the whole deal. And then you see the pictures in the newspaper, then he's got his hair all just right. And he's got a suit on a product, you know, $2,500 suit. And what's he saying in that courtroom? Yes, your honor. No, your honor. Yes, your honor. None of those on those albums. But you know what he has a sense for, for context, doesn't he? I thought he was trying out to become a leader for a boy scout pack or something like that. The way he cleaned up. He's no stupid person though. When someone has a position of judgment in your life, even on a temporal level, on the human level, human being to human being, you, if you're smart at all, you show that judge respect how much more when the judge is the one who will judge you as it relates to eternity. And they are despising the son before whom they will one day stand. And Jesus will be judge at that place here. They're thinking they're judging him and they got a little power there and Jerusalem and all, and they've, they don't understand what's going on at all. And so Jesus is speaking to them about this. Listen, you despise me. You scorn me. I am, I have the position of judge. And of course, everyone will have one of two relationships with Jesus as it relates to the eternal judgment. And that is, we will know him either a savior or judge. There's nothing else in between. And so here he speaks to them. Father has entrusted judgment to him. And then he said, most assuredly, now he tells them how they can avoid facing him as judge. Most assuredly, I say to you, verily, verily, that's kind of a listen up as if you need something, a little oomph to listen up to when God is speaking. But, but he knew how to gather their attention. Verily, verily in the old King James, most assuredly in the new King James, most assuredly I say to you, he who hears my word and believes in him who sent me has present tense everlasting life and shall not come into judgment, but has passed from death into life. And he's saying, you better believe what I'm telling you. And you better trust in God's way of salvation, which involves me. And most assuredly, I say to you that the hour is coming. And now is when the dead, and this seems to refer to the spiritually dead, dead in trespasses and sin will hear the voice of the son of God as Jesus proclaim the gospel in his public ministry. And those who hear will live for, as the father has give has life in himself. So he has granted the son to have life in himself. And so here they are again from John one, Jesus is declaring himself to be eternal and self-existent something no mere human being is. He said, um, and has given him verse 27 authority to execute judgment because he is the son of man. So you've got the son of God, son of God, son of God, son of God, son of God, son of God, son of man sticks out like a sore thumb, doesn't it? And what it's saying in the context of judgment is that Jesus is uniquely qualified to be judged over man because he's the great God, man, all God, all man, all at the same time. And do not marvel at this for the hour is coming in which all who are in the graves will hear his voice and come forth. Those who have done good to the resurrection of life and those who have done evil to the resurrection of condemnation. And so here Jesus is talking about when he went, uh, three days and three nights and the heart of the earth. Remember he goes down there, has a little retreat, you know, every good retreat is three days and three nights. And he goes down there. What does he do? He preaches to those who have died prior to his coming. And you've got in Luke chapter 16 there, Abraham's bosom. And then you've got the hot side. Lazarus is in Abraham's bosom and the rich man is in the hot side and all. And when Jesus at the end of, of his declaring himself, I'm the Messiah that you were looking ahead to when he clears out Abraham's bosom, he takes the captives from their captivity. What does he do? He clears out the faith side. He clears out the Abraham's bosom side. And we read in one of the synoptic gospels, what the patriarchs were walking through the street, following his resurrection in Jerusalem. So he cleared that, that side out. And so that resurrection is an ongoing resurrection, the resurrection of the just Jesus was the first fruits of that resurrection. And so that resurrection continues on until the end of the age, the second resurrection, which is for those that have rejected Christ. And as a result have lived life and evil life, that's a resurrection to condemnation reference to the white throne judgment. Jesus said in verse 30, I can of myself do nothing doesn't mean, Oh, I can't do anything. I'm powerless or anything like that. He says, I can't do anything independent of the father. We are so intertwined again, the, the, the, the issue of equality and harmony running through the whole thing. He said of myself, I can do nothing because everything that I do is in unity with the father. As I hear, I judge and my judgment is righteous because I do not seek my own will, but the will of the father who sent me. And then Jesus declares four witnesses to the truthfulness of what he was saying about himself in verse 31. He said, if I bear witness of myself, my witness is not true. That doesn't mean that Jesus could lie or it all, but he, the context is the Jewish judicial system under the law of Moses. You could not one witness alone was not enough to establish a fact in a Jewish court of law. It took two witnesses or more. So Jesus comes in and says, he said, he said, if I bear witness of myself, I am the only witness to what I'm saying. Then my witness is not true. In other words, it's not valid as testimony. And he's talking to religious leaders who are very, very legal in their thinking. They low law know the law of Moses and they need proof and witnesses and all this kind of stuff. They're trying Jesus. So Jesus is going to turn the whole thing around on him. He's going to bring four witnesses to the witness stand, so to speak, to testify to the fact that he is who he says he is. And the first witness he brings to the witness stand is John the Baptist. Therefore, there is another who bears witness of me. And I know that the witness, which he testifies of me is true, that he is in capital letters. And there it's talking about the father who ministered through John the Baptist, but in verse 33, clearly he's talking about John. You have sent to John and he has borne witness to the truth yet. I do not receive testimony from man, but I say these things that you may be saved. He was a burning and shining lamp and you were willing for a time to rejoice in his light. So he comes the first witness of the truthfulness, a witness independent of me, so to speak, but not independent of the father. The first witness I called the witness stand to testify to the truthfulness that I am the promised Messiah and I am the son of God and God the son is John the Baptist and John the Baptist had declared these things to them. And so that was the other witness. There is kind of a emotion there in verse 34. That's interesting as Jesus says, and yet I do not receive testimony from men. In other words, I am what I am. It doesn't matter what anyone says, but he condescends. To these men, who do they think they are? They're putting them on this trial and he said, but I say these things that you may be saved. I mean, here they are. The God who created the heavens and the earth is before them. They not only don't believe him, they reject him. They want to kill him and all of these things. And Jesus said, the reason I deal so patiently with you is so the light will go on for you and you'll get saved. Now, was God patient with any of you before you came to know the Lord? No. Look to the left, look to the right, look to the left. Very patient. I'm amazed at what nonsense he was willing to find himself in the middle of while waiting for the light to go on for me. Verse 35, John the Baptist was a burning and shining lamp. You're willing for a time to rejoice in his light. In other words, they loved John the Baptist as long as he was saying things that they wanted him to say. But the second he began to say things that didn't fit what they wanted, then all of a sudden they rejected him. Then the second witness is the witness of his miracles in verse 36. But I have a greater witness than John's for the works which the father has given me to finish. The very works that I do bear witness of me that the father has sent me. Now, between the time, the end of the Old Testament and Jesus's, John the Baptist coming and Jesus's birth in the New Testament, there's a 400 year period where nothing was happening in terms of miracles and these kinds of things among the Jewish people. So it wasn't like Jesus came on and started to do a bunch of miracles, but like there were just a bunch of miracles going on every day anyway. There hadn't been anything going on for hundreds of years. He comes on the scene and all of a sudden he starts to do these things and they were intended to cause people to stop and go, wait a second, this is the Messiah. This is what God told us would be true of the Messiah when he came that he would do these miracles. That's why in John chapter three, when Nicodemus comes to Jesus, he said, we know that you are come from God because no one can do the works that you do. And I say, we're come from God. And Nicodemus knew that the works themselves testified to what Jesus was saying they ought to have, but they didn't. And then witness number three, the Jesus pulls to the witness stand, so to speak, is the father himself and the father himself who sent me, has testified of me. You have neither heard his voice at any time nor seen his form, but you do not have his word abiding in you because whom he sent him, you do not believe here. They are these experts, so-called experts in the Bible, and, and they have missed the whole intention of the Bible. You notice as he moves now from the testimony of the father now to the testimony of the scriptures as being a witness to the fact that he is the Messiah, that he is the son of God. You search the scriptures and they did for in them. You think you have eternal life, but these are they which testify of me. The entirety of the book testifies to Jesus Christ as the Messiah, the Old Testament, the Messiah and Savior promised, the New Testament, the Savior, the son of God come and revealed. The Bible is not a terribly complicated book, though it is that in some respects, but it is essentially a record of the creation of man, the fall of man, and the redemption of man. The creation of man, Genesis 1 and 2, the fall of man, Genesis chapter 3, and from Genesis chapter 4 on the entire theme supremely God's intent for the book is it is a story of his redemption. And he begins even there in chapter 3 to begin to speak of the virgin birth of the Messiah who was to come, the seed of the woman. And so it's possible and there are people, I've run into people that they know the, they know the Bible like crazy as a textbook or something. And they got these weird, I mean, weird deals about the whole thing versus coming in their mind and the whole thing and everything. And they have no, no belief in Jesus as the Messiah. They've missed the whole thing. You search the scriptures for in them you think you have everlasting life, but these are they which testify of me. And then he said now in verse 40 to the end of the chapter, let's really talk about honestly why you have rejected me. It isn't all of these other things. The reason that you're not willing to come to me, and there's four of them. He said the reason that you haven't come to me, verse 40, but you're not willing to come to me that you may have everlasting life. The problem with them was not a scriptural problem as it related to Jesus. They just weren't willing to come to him. And you know why they weren't willing to come to him? They didn't like the way he did things. They didn't like the Messiah that the father sent too bad. Be thankful there is one. Be thankful there is a savior. But they weren't willing because God wasn't doing things the way that he wanted. You look at the multitude of people that want anything to do with Jesus. Let's say, well, what God would you have anything to do with? They begin to describe them and you realize they're describing themselves. That's what they wanted. They wanted a God that they could kind of fashion and all, but that's not the way the universe works. And I'm thankful for it. And he said, I do not receive honor from men, but I know you that you do not have the love of God in you. And the second reason that they had rejected is they did not have the love of God. They did not have a love for God in them. If they had truly had a love for the father in them, then they would have had a love for the son. What they really loved was they loved position. They loved their little spiritual kingdom. They love their power that they had on all that kind of stuff. That's what they really loved. And they didn't really love God though. They gave all of these outward indications that they did. Jesus said, I have come in my father's name and you do not receive me. If another comes in his own name, him, you will receive speaking of the antichrist that who will one day come when you, when you, when you reject the true Messiah, which is what Israel has done as a nation. And the Jews have in large part done is a people. When you reject the true Messiah, all you're left with now is a false Messiah. That's all that, that, that you've taken the off the board, the right one. Now you are completely set up to believe in the wrong one. The antichrist is going to come on the scene and he's going to allow him to build the temple and all these different things. And as, as you're well aware, you know, in Israel today, when they, when you talk to people about how they'll recognize the Messiah, when he comes, they do, we've had this conversation in Jerusalem over it. He will allow us to build our temple. And we know from the new Testament, there's going to be the antichrist that allows them to rebuild the temple. And then partway through halfway through the great tribulation, he will go into the Holy of Holies and demand to be worshiped as God. Then the Jews will realize we have chosen the wrong one. And he's come now in his own name. And then all of a sudden everybody's running for the Hills. And so Jesus warns them of the consequence of rejecting him as the Messiah. It leaves you set up for deception. How can you believe who receive honor from one another and do not seek the honor that comes from the only God they rejected Jesus because they loved honor from men rather than honor from God. That was their main concern was that people would honor them rather than having God honor them. And, uh, and so that, that kind of set them up for the same thing. Whenever my greatest concern is what people will think of me rather than what God will think of me, then all of a sudden I'm going to have to choose one way or the other. As we said this morning, those two groups are God isn't really a group, but those two are going in two entirely different directions. And so I'm going to have the praise either of this world and sinful man. I'm going to have the praise of God. There's, there's no, I'm not going to get both of them out of it. And so they wanted the praise of their fellow, uh, religious leaders and, and they weren't willing to make the stand, lose that in order to acknowledge Jesus as the Messiah. And again, um, when Nicodemus in, in John chapter three comes to Jesus and he comes as a Pharisee and a member of the Sanhedrin. Again, it's interesting to remember that when he came to them, he said, we know that you are come from God. Not I know that you're come from God. We know that you're come from God because no one could do the miracles. There was a widespread understanding of who Jesus was apparently among the religious leaders, but they were unwilling to give up the honor they were receiving from men in order to accept the truth and follow the true Messiah happens all the time today. Just not a necessarily a religious context, but a secular context in this world. He said, do you think, do not think that I shall accuse you to the father. There's one who accuses you, Moses and whom you trust. And they were the great students of the law. So they thought in their own minds, we trust in Moses and Moses and Moses were experts in Moses and all of this. And they thought that Jesus and Moses were out of harmony with one another. And so here Jesus comes in and says, do not think that I shall accuse you to the father. I don't need to do it. I, the one that you trust the most accuses you. And that's Moses. If you had believed Moses, you would believe me for he wrote about me. But if you do not believe his writings, how will you believe my words? They didn't believe Jesus because they didn't believe Moses's writings. And when Jesus told them that you don't believe in Moses, that had to seem like the craziest thing that anyone could say to them. We're the experts on Moses, on the law and on the prophets. But Jesus has been declaring through this entire section. What he has been declaring equality and harmony with the father. What did Moses declare in Genesis chapter one, verse 26, he declared there is the record God speaking. Let us make man in our image, according to our likeness, revealing what the plurality within the Godhead. And if they had been honest students of the law of Moses, then they would have recognized when Jesus came on the scene and declared himself to be equal with God, to be God, the son, to be operating in harmony with the father. It should have been like, wow, I could have had a V8. You're the guy that we've been waiting for. We wouldn't have accepted anyone who made a lesser claim concerning themselves. Then of course, God, as the record goes on in the very next verse, and that first book of Moses in Genesis. Where the Lord then declares, and so God created man in his own image and in the image of God, he created them. Let us make man. They had been careful students of the law of Moses, then they would have recognized him to be the Messiah.