Chuck Missler, Gospel of John, Chapter 1, Session 2

[Music] I'd like to welcome you all to our exploration of the Gospel of John and anytime that we enter the Word of God we always want to do that with the benefit of prayer so let's begin by long our hearts father we thank you for your word we thank you Father for your word incarnate that's came and tabernacled among us we thank you Father for this precious precious book we do pray father through your Holy Spirit you would open this book to our hearts and lives that we each might grow in grace and the knowledge of our coming King and that we might be more effective stewards of the opportunities that you bring across uh paths as we commit this hour and ourselves into your hands in the name of Yeshua coming King Indy amen so we're in the second session of the Gospel of John and we're going to primarily focus on the part of chapter one we didn't get to last time but since we do have some new people and also just as a way of getting into the pace of things here I'll spend a few moments reviewing what we did touch on last time and last time I spent some substantial time up front with some background on what we call hermeneutical caveats hermeneutics is the study of the theory of interpretation and everybody has a an approach to the text the biblical text and that's collectively called your Henrickson and we hold some very strange views and I want to mention that not that you have to agree with this but you'll at least know where we're coming from and we'll express many views that are controversial we'll try to express both sides where we think it's justified but again I want to make make it clear that we're not here to sell a viewpoint we're anxious to help you become what we call a cell feeder to understand the Bible enough so that you can find your own answers up and so what we share is really intended just to be supportive of your own journey and adventure through the scripture and so we are very very focused here on the integrity of design we hold the view that that every detail every number our replacement in the 66 books that we call the Bible it's an integrated package and once you discover that it changes your whole view you also quickly discover then it had to have its origin from outside the dimensionality of time it also caused us to really regard every detail is relevant we hold the view of every number every placed name every detail in the scripture is there by deliberate design and when you discover that for yourself it changes your whole perspective of the scripture and another view we have that we've discovered and especially more recent years we've come to the view that there are no synonyms not real sermons two words can be synonymous in that they mean almost the same thing I watch out for that almost because in their differences often lies a major discovery so we're really we've been drawn to that for 65 years of study we we've been drawn to the idea of precision especially in eschatology he starts eschatology is most study the last things is because it's most challenging because it requires everything else to fit into a pattern but the other thing we did last time there is a challenge that has become a trademark over more than four decades and that's ex 1711 but we've also discovered that it has aspects that we didn't fully appreciate until the last few years so I want to talk a little bit about that challenge and specifically some background that emerges from that so the the trademark verse that's been our trademark for many decades comes out of acts 17:11 where Luke deals with the people in Berea they said these were more noble than those in Thessalonica where they came from in that they did two things they received the word with all readiness of mind and searched the Scriptures daily to prove where those things were so and we've adopted that verse very early on the presumption that the emphasis but all the way I usually equip it is that that's where Luke tells you don't believe anything chuck Missler tells you but check it out for yourself that's been our flavor of applying that Wrayburn but we've discovered that's not the most challenging part the most challenging part of applying this verse is something we took for granted for many years and that's to receive the word with all readiness of mind and one of the things I've discovered is that most people have trouble with their Bible because of preconceptions of presuppositions they've been taught that are not true about the Bible or anything else for that matter we carry presuppositions and one of the secrets to learning is to set our presumptions of presuppositions aside to receive what's being said to evaluate with speed said and so that's to shed our erroneous prism astonishing to me to discover how many of us have been programmed with erroneous information about our universe and what's amazing to me is much of our concerns biblically come from misinformation about what we do know about the universe so the brilliant challenge is Part B that I used to emphasize the idea of searching in scriptures because it is the only reliable source of truth one of our challenges in life is to really find out what's true and the word there is an Ocoee no no to investigate or exempt to prove you'd search the Scriptures to prove whether things are really so but it's part a that I took for granted for most of my career that I began to realize in more recent years is really the problem that most people have to overcome and about right away some people have misinformation about the Bible it gets in the way most the people we deal with have information that comes from so-called science that is in the way so misconceptions and prejudices of inaccuracies in myopia about reality and so it's in that vein there's another aspect that we talked about in some depth last time we'll hit it very lightly this time just to give you a perspective here and that is to realize that we have we've discovered there are boundaries to our what we call reality I use that like true P of an N of of DaVinci to represent man's reach and if I want to deal with that which is larger than man and size goes increases to the right on the little diagram here if I'm going to the larger world we call the macrocosm that's our universe and that takes us into the field of astronomy and astrophysics and they shock you to discover I won't get into it all here but most of what you probably thought about astronomy turns out not to be true it's not gravity driven outside the solar system so that leads to all kinds of other errors in thinking we know the key thing about 20th century science is that we now know the universe is finite and that's a profound discovery that's what leads to the speculations about the Big Bang and all those kinds of things we know the universe may be expanding but it's finite it's not infinite well if we go the other way and look at smallness we get into even a bigger shock and that is that there's a limit to smallness and that leads us to quantum physics and subatomic particles and all of that the main thing there is that they've discovered is that everything whether it's length mass energy or time is made up of indivisible units they call them quanta collectively but there's lengths that you cannot divide you get down to that 10 to the minus 33 centimeters you try to divide that it loses a property called locality that thing that you're trying to divide is suddenly everywhere in the universe of the same that doesn't make sense to the average person doesn't make sense in a lot of ways but that is it what quantum physics has discovered and proven be honored beyond a dispute so the point I'm getting at is if we put what we know about the universe in perspective we know there's a limit to largeness it's finite not infinite and there's a limit to smallness that everything is made up of indivisible units which means that we are in an a Digital simulated environment and now that which is larger than large and smaller than small is collectively the medicine it's embraces with margins and smallness all together and the medic Azam is the region in which most of the Bible deals when it's angels or demons or whatever here in the meta cause of not in the physical world as we sense it and so we want to understand it and this is not a fringe perspective in the Jewish of 2005 Scientific American had an article which point out the our universe is but a shadow of a larger reality and that caught my eye because that's exactly what the Bible has been saying all along and we need to understand that by understanding that it suddenly makes a lot of other things clearer because we're gonna discover in every field of science the frontier has already been anticipated in the biblical text that's the study what's all right well let's get into the Gospel of John one thing he does he doesn't late in his book but he tells you why he wrote it Matthew Mark and Luke really just write a history but John is quite clear that he's not writing a essay in the traditional sense it's a knobhead piece it sees expresses he's designed this to convince you of something John says and many other signs at the end of his writing you'll find this in chapter 20 and many other signs truly did Jesus in the presence of the disciples which are not written in this book but these are written that you might believe that Jesus is the Messiah mushiya the Christ the Son of God and that believing you might have life through his name now this word Christ by the way if you get the International Standard Version Bible the latest news from out your discovery where Christ is not up here in the New Testament they use the word Messiah same word but it carries the Jewish root if you will because that's what we're dealing with many people Jesus Christ they think that's his last name no no no it's the title and okay so we shouldn't have any problem out here he has an agenda John's writing this that you might have life through his name that's his goal he has an objective needs unabashed about and he says many other signs John picks seven of them there dozens in the other Gospels in fact there's five of the seven are unique to Joe so he's picked these deliberately because it's a seven signs changing we're next in the next session that we go we're going to join in chapter 2 we're going to count the strange the first miracle he does is changing water into wine at Cana and and why and what's all but a tall Wow then later on chapter four he'll heal the official Sun in Capernaum he'll heal an invalid by the Pool of Bethesda and feeding 5,000 near the Sea of Galilee he walks in the water in chapter six healing the blind man in Jerusalem and raising dead Lazarus at Bethany he selected these seven out of many dozens and he did it with a particular reason five of these by the way are unique to John's Gospel but something else you encounter in his gospel seven times jesus makes it what I call an IM state and he claims in Chapter eight to be the voice of the very English many people are shocked by that but in seven I am statements I am the bread of life in Chapter six I am the light of the world in Chapter eight I am the gate for the Sheep in Chapter ten I am The Good Shepherd in that same chapter I am the resurrection of the life in Chapter eleven incident of course to the Lazarus event and then I am The True Vine in chapter 15 and so he makes the 7rm statements which causes it this is one of the reasons I suspect I don't know of a lot of other scholars that hold this view they are maybe in a small minority here but I'm among those it's becoming convinced that John wrote his gospel after his experience on the campus near the later part of his life as you know he was in exile at that must that's where he had the experience that led to the book of Revelation he then retires at Ephesus for many eat for some years and writes his gospel see when you read the book of Revelation it's clearly choreographed signs that all fit the 777 and so forth when you read the Gospel of John you don't notice it unless you look for it but once you're sensitive to it you suddenly see it everywhere it is just as tightly designed or choreographed as the local relation is it's just done with a softer touch you know you're not as conscious of it if you will and I think I suspect that he had the benefit of the insights a relation with people by the way that's just a hypothesis you can come to your own conclusions as you get more familiar with the book let's just jump right in and we stick with John we get confronted right up front with the first couple verses in the beginning was the word and the Word was with God and the Word was God the same was in the beginning with God now casual reading it sounds like double-talk until you start looking at very closely in it's actually in beginning and that term is a little misleading in the English it really means before time began it's not like getting started no no it's before time itself began and we know today so you and I have the benefit of Einstein's theory of relativity we fit outbuild event at some point but we know today that time is a physical property time varies with mass acceleration and gravity and so the fact that you're dealing in the spirit world means you're outside need lots of time and you're outside time altogether is the point so time varies with mass acceleration and gravity obviously so God is outside our time domain this shows up even in the in the linguistic structure here in the beginning was the word the Greek word is logos and it's a mistake to assume that that word just simply means word like a word in the list if you will it's more than just Alexa graphical term it's a principal thought or concepts or it embraces it's an expression or utterance of that concept and it's interesting that this turns out to be a title there are many many titles you can put on Jesus Christ you may titled you can give God this is the highest he puts this even above his name is all this Jewish interest in the name of God they have all kinds of traditions about that but here's this is this is his highest title and the word in the Greek term the word logos can be rendered word like like but it's long if you think of it just as a word in the list Greek has two other terms that primary identifying individual words and would like in a dictionary or something like that this one is a high title for a concept committee that's being expressed and the Word was with God now the word with there's person the Greek it really means mutual fellowship and intercommunication close personal relationship it almost has the flavor of the Greek term Koinonia which is like being a fiduciary and incidentally if you go to that you quickly recognize these words is being very similar to the opening book the lines of Genesis at the beginning God created heaven and earth and if you look at the word God in the Hebrew with Elohim Elohim is a plural and the word Elohim every place it's used in the Old Testament it's used as if it was singular but it's actually a plural word and what's interesting about Hebrew plurals is that they require three or more so it's actually a hint of the Trinity right here and they in the first sentence of the Torah but let's move in the in beginning it precedes time itself before the world was in other words and there was is there is an imperfect in the immigrant which means it implies continuous existence oh it's coming into being and in the end the word of course was the Alpha Omega and easy call through the scripture before the world was created the word already existed this is a better way to express that it that's the better way to represent the Greek and then we add verse three and this is a shocker to many people to really realize what this says all things were made by him and without him was not anything made that was made he was crucified on a cross of wood yet he made the very hill in which it's dead and what's interesting to me about this since my personal background has been in the information sciences information science per se has become at the vanguard of every field of science whether you talk about physics and quantum physics there were challenges area or information issues and biology microbiology DNA and all that's becoming information science dominated frontier Darwinian views have a problem with the origin of information they can't explain where they came from the highest title of deity is the logos and I love the definition of truth my wife came up with this one doing some research some time ago truth is when the word and the deed become one and Jesus manifests that that's what John is going to preoccupy himself with in this first chapter is that the word became flesh and tabernacled among us that's a incredible thing he contains verse 4 in him was life and life was the light of men in the light shines in darkness and darkness comprehended that not the light of men and he said you'll say Jeffrey I am the light of the world and besides that and Chuck 9 also and the darkness comprehended it not and that was a strange word it means it wasn't overtaken it wasn't the darkness could not extinguish the light and but John's summary of all this is that light will invade the Dominion of darkness Satan is the ruler and his subjects resist the light but will be unable to frustrate its power and finally the word will be victorious in spite of the opposition that's the flavor that's John's summary of what we're dealing with here but it leads whether it comes in with another word we talk about logos as a special word there's another word that we dwelled on to last time I'm just doing is slightly it gets started here and that is the word for light or folks in the Greek like photon or I like photo and so forth I've been haunted for over a year by a phrase and I think the Lord gave me middlefoot night that metaphors reign were mysteries reside in the insight that some of these words are more than just a metaphor the metaphor is hiding something that has a secret hidden and it's one of the continuing mysteries in physics is the nature of light and we last time looked at three factors astutely we looked at the two-slit paradox relax I'm not going to go through that again the nonlocality of photons and the photographic unit these are fundamental mysteries to this day in the field of physics and so it's it the word light itself has eluded fully understanding in our most advanced Sciences we do know that the creation calendar occurs Revelation redemption is by his word and he's been John will remind us that he that have seen me I've seen the father so how do you discover God is the lurking question that we're all going to be asking you that by learning about Jesus that's the net of all that Jesus is God's manifestation to us and so let's just jump in to start the narrative there was a man sent from God whose name was John don't confuse this deal and this is John the Baptist John the Apostle is writing the gospel that we're going to encounter a lot of discussion here about this very unusual guy mining the John the Baptist but continuing here the same came for a witness to bear witness of the light that all men through him might believe and he was not that light but he was sent to bear witness of that light that's going to clarify here in a little bit now John the Baptist is interesting he was the lasted in fact he definitively closes the Old Testament we're going to discover that the Jesus will say that the law and the prophets were until John the Old Testament in closes malachite close with John the Baptist he's going some very strange remarks he'll defer that until we get into all that later but he also goes a first Herald if you will then in the New Testament that was the true light which lighteth every man that comes in the world he was in the world and the world was made by him and here's the staggering statement and the world knew him not the more you know about him the more you know of the Old Testament the more you realize the extremes gone as far to that God has gone to through all these years it's astonishing that when the Messiah finally makes his appearance they didn't know it Sidney said Becky Burnett he was that true light and so he came unto his own his own received enough memory versus this is probably one of your key words in this chapter speaking of Jesus he came into his own his own received or not but precious word but as many as received him to them gave he the power to become the sons of God even to them that believe on his name now that phrase sons of God in the Hebrew in the Old Testament refers to the direct creation of God and what it's not just a figure of speech here it's a specific empowerment that we're going to have explained to us by Jesus himself in Chapter three and where does that term born-again come from it's just an idiom or is there something special going on we're going to deal with that we get to chapter three but this is a tragedy of Israel's whole history is that they came to zone as only see them not and so if you're a son of god you're a new creation direct from God himself as many as received only the New Testament use of receive is in this sense as receiving crisis the only reference to that by the way this may surprise you and the son of God here is using the Old Testament sense John and Paul used different terms for believers if you will then we'll move on here which were born not of blood nor the will of flesh nor of the will of man but of God and I say we'll expand on this in John 3 so on this is intended just to be a opening review here I don't want to get buried again and all these things and predestination is implied here we'll get to that in John chapter 6 and John chapter 10 and verse 14 and the Word was made flesh and dwelt among us and we beheld his glory the glory as of the only begotten father full of grace and truth he dwelt the words actually tabernacled interesting word it's a tent and he tended cast his tent among us all of us in our tents by the way did you realize that yeah if I look out at you and my problems I can't see you oh we can see the temporary residence you're in see the real you isn't hardware/software and so we'll call it soul spirit whatever that software not hardware it has no mass which means it has no time it's eternal whether you're saved or not that's the problem but we'll get more into that later and we beheld his glory or inspected if you will and his glory the word there is this nation shaken up and the glories have the only begotten of the Father and the absolute uniqueness of Jesus that John is going to really hit all through his 21 chapters here this term Tabernacle though is a very interesting word suggestive of anything yes he he wrote a tabernacle to - what about a tag what's it how is God dwelling with as well it's a temporary dwelling okay just like we're living in a temporary dwelling it's humble it's outwardly unattractive and it's the center of the camp it's the place where the law was preserved he was a place of sacrifice place where the priests fed and a place of worship it was all characterized the tabernacle Odin's warnings and also characterized in a sense Messiah in his earthly ministry but if we take a look at the tabernacle as you find it in a Bible and it's about visualize and choral about a cubit it's roughly it's roughly 75 feet by 150 feet all you see is a lemon fence all you see is white line fence we go through you come to the altar of sacrifice and then the Laver and then you get to the holy place Tabernacle proper if you will and that's the part we want to understand because we hit there's a plate the first room is called the holy place and the inner compartments called the Holy of Holies and there's a door and then there is a menorah the seven-branched candlestick I am the vine you the branches the one plus the six makes the seven and so forth we discover this great cosmic symbolism in every detail here and the table of showbread and the golden altar and altar of incense and then there's a veil and through the mounting the holy Holies there's the Ark of the Covenant which has it along the tables of stone on top of it a separate piece of furniture but not just the lid it was a separate piece of furniture called the mercy seat so these are the counting the two things that are outside there seven pieces of furniture every one of those piece of furniture speaks of Jesus and what do I mean by that yet Word was made flesh and tabernacled among us he says I am the door these are the I am statements coming out I am the light of the world I am the bread of life of course the our resistance is the intercession for us and he's also our sin bearer and of course the propitiation for us and so he's he's expressed in each any one of those things well let's get back to these word in the beginning was the word we opened this up with and then we had the word was made flesh if we take the triplet opened it and the triplet we find in verse 14 it reads together doesn't it new beginning was the word the Word was made flesh the Word was with God the word dwelt among us the Word was God full of leisure without three that will be a triplet here it comes out of the next few verses here so this was intended to be my review so we'll try to go from here to it the rest of the chapter for the next ten verses if you will so verse 15 God bear witness of him and cried saying this was he of whom I speak he that cometh after me is preferred before me for he was before me John the Baptist turns out to be one of most important guys in the New Testament he's spoken of at least 89 times and of course he closes the Old Testament and so he that cometh after me is preferred before me and that of course is referring to Jesus who clarifiers all that in chapter 8 because Jesus says before your father Abraham rejoiced to see my day he sought with glad and then said the Jews in him you know yet 50 years old using James have you seen Abraham he said very very I said to you before Abraham was I am deliberately using the phraseology of Exodus before but he that cometh after me is preferred before me their key thing now John was five months older wasn't he for he was before me sounds like double-talk doesn't he was before me could be an allusion to Micah 5:2 remember the born in Bethlehem whose goings forth have been from everlasting and so on and so this raises another interesting issue that I'll touch on to give you a little departure here when as John the Baptist boy may surprise you we can pin that down pretty well it looks like Elizabeth was John's mother was a cousin of Marian the wife of a priest named Zechariah who was of the course and the subgroup if you will of idea the priests were divided in 24 courses at each course if it officiated in the temple from one week from Sabbath to Sabbath and he was in the course of the budget and when the temple was destroyed by Titus in August 5th of 70 AD the first course of priests had just taken office we know from Josephus well that's great that gives us now a grid we can nail down because we know they changed every week for 24 weeks so since the course of modules the eighth course we can track backwards and determine the sucker is ended his duties apparently on July 13th of 3 BC ok that's helpful if the birth of John took place 280 days later it would have been on April 19th to 20th to BC precisely on Passover that year interestingly enough as our Gustus died on august 1914 ad that was also the accession year for Tiberias which is recorded in the Gospel of Luke John began his ministry in the fifteenth year of Tiberius okay and so John was born on April 19th of 2 BC his 30th birthday and wait till he was 30 to be a previous prophets or the surge birthday would have been on April 19-20 29 ad or the 15th year of Tobias it ties together extremely enough ok God's repeated introduction of Jesus as the Lamb of God is interesting because John was indeed born on Passover that interesting enough and this seems to confirm to BC is the birth date and since John was 5 months older this would also confirm an autumn birthday for Jesus ok never done been me I think here in New Zealand you're probably closer to the real birthday then we are in America if you will strangely enough Elizabeth heater self for five months and then the angel Gabriel announced to married both Elizabeth's condition and that Mary would also bear a center be called Jesus Mary went in haste that is Elizabeth who was taken in the first week over sixth month of the fourth week of December third B and December 3rd BC if Jesus was born 280 days later it would place the date it was birth on September 29th to BC now many different scholars have different guesses as to when his birthday was this isn't the only one it's the one that to me the head had the most support but doesn't is correct either obviously some number of places that this could be have some variability but if Jesus was born September 29th to disease interesting because then that year that year that was the first officially the day of Yom Kippur the Feast of Trumpets so that some people make a lot of it don't would make too much of it because it may not be correct but it's a nifty thing and so this is just one of the possible conjectures let's move on verse 16 and of his fullness we have all received the grace for grace and the log was given by Moses but grace and truth came by Jesus Christ and the grace is God's favor and kindness bestowed on those who do not deserve it cannot earn it you understand the difference between grace and mercy grace is getting something your desert and mercy is not getting what you do they are very similar but there Jesus - okay now this leads us to another metaphor as you know from last time I like to nail some of these down because metaphors can often masquerade to hide the fact that we're there's underlying mysteries that we have yet to resolve we talked about logos at some length last time we talked about light last time this word grace is arguably the most amazing of the three and yes we have a song amazing grace that understates it even there the grace the more you understand the grace of God the more astonishing it is try to summarize it chapter 3 he says if the kindness and love of God our Savior toward man not by works of righteousness which we have done that's the the capsule issue so it's always set in contrast the law under which god demands righteousness from men as under grace he gave righteousness to men that's the contrast the law blesses the good grace saves the bad the law demands that blessings be owned grace is a free gift and it's astonishing despite all the trouble we have trying to understand the law and we have all of us have various equivalent about that I need a bigger problem that we struggle with is coming to terms of the fact that grace is a free gift that's why I make the statement that Jesus Christ is the most anti-religious person that will walk the earth you have to be careful what you mean by religion religion is man's attempt to reconcile himself with God he can't all these things that we think we should be doing our man's attempts to reconcile himself a guy can't do it God's done the whole job and he's jealous about that trying to add to what he's completed he can said he considers insulting it strangely enough so this grace thing is there's not as simple as it sounds at first and so in Jesus Christ grace and truth reach their fullness and this fullness is available to us that's really why we're all here truth is when the word the deed become one we are saved by grace Paul tells us and features 2:8 now we also live by grace earlier we saved by grace we live by grace and depend on God's grace in all that we do and that's the tough thing to learn that's where we're so grateful for Paul's writing because he really elaborates all of that not only in Ephesians but first Corinthians and and so on it's over let's continue some other problems here no man has seen God at any time the only begotten Son which is in the bosom of the Father he hath declared him and see no man has seen God the only thing representations happen and God is spirit as will be explained when we get to John chapter 4 it's going to get into that again and so you know with the God sent us a pose of all these are three weeks depressions back from verse 14 in effect that he hath declared him and yet no didn't is Isaiah said my eyes have seen the king the Lord Almighty Isaiah claims you've seen him again it's a representation of him God in His essence is invisible Paul tells first Timothy did killing his first letter in Chapter 1 he's being first Timothy 6 he says he is the one who no one has seen or can't see you could see representations of you can see the his true essence no one has ever seen God's essential nature's what verse 18 is trying to get at here God can be seen what we call it theophany an appearance and after by morphism but his inner essence or nature is disclosed only in Jesus now if we take those triplets remember we took the in the beginning was the word and the word was made flesh turns out if you take these they'll a pretty nicely in the beginning was the word the Word was made flesh no man hath seen God at any time the Word was with God the word dwelt among us and we begotten son which was in the Father the Word was God full of grace and truth he hath declared him it's interesting how this thing flows you get a sense of some choreography going on here verse 19 and this is the record of John when the Jews sent priests and Levites from Jerusalem to ask him who art thou he confessed and I not but confessed I am NOT the Christ john is preaching at Bethabara which is on the Jordan if you're in Jerusalem and you want to go down there it's 20 30 mile drive and they rent a car okay then I don't think they had a desert hurts back then but there are so many people that are going from Jerusalem to Bethabara to hear John the Baptist but the temple has put together an inquiry team to find out what's going on he's drawing a huge crowd over 20 miles away on foot okay so they came to ask him court you he confess it denied I'm not the confession they presume maybe thinks as long as I know it and by the way when John uses the word the Jews that's what we call a synecdoche when you use the specific for the general of the general for disabilities if it's a figure of speech John is using the term Jews to speak of the leadership of the Jews and that's that occurs in a number of critical places that has led to misunderstandings that have been exploited in centuries of abuse to the Jews who killed the Messiah as my cents on it put him on that cross the idea that Jews didn't owe the Jews didn't if you have a legal right did the Romans had to do it for them so there's all that anti-semitism that's built around a misunderstanding of phrases in the Gospel of John John uses that term to refer to the leadership it's been analyzed for some scholars that less than 13 people probably could account for the whole thing I'm going to move on here he's usually the title for the city's leaders everybody's entity the temple people are anticipating one of three answers the Messiah is one of them he's expected as a Micah 5:2 in Isaiah 9:6 and you know all verses there Elisha was expected because of Malachi and the prophet of moses is mentioned Deuteronomy 18 so there's three kinds of possibilities that the temple Enquirer's could expect does he think is in desire as you think he's no why'd you come back or is he that prophet that Moses made Aleutians those are the three possibility to keep coming up by the way in several places now the Missy the Messiah anticipation comes from three different places will notice that when we get to Luke chapter 2 in our studies Simeon was expecting the Messiah and it was treated to seeing the baby there in Luke records then and Anna the same thing same kind of thing she also these are two people that were expecting the Messiah and recognize Christ and as a babe in the temple priests temple proceedings recorded motion movie and when we get to later on to what we call the triumphal entry will discover the Gabriel told Daniel five centuries earlier the exact day that Jesus would ride that presenting self-esteem and the shocker there will be that Jesus held them accountable to know that that's the obverse of that whole issue and we'll get to a lot of that later yes Herman what then are you Elias and said no I'm not are you that prophet being the prophet of Moses he said no that prophet is a one that was predicted in Deuteronomy 18 now this leads to a couple of other issues the possibility of future roles for both Moses and Elijah Elijah is no problem because he never died remember he was raptured if I use that expression or translated Moses is also had his ministry interrupted and and we find Michael was fighting over with Satan over his body what's all that enough see three were expected as we notice here the Messiah Elijah this confusion about whether John the Baptist was ontology because he came in the spirit blood come on like your buddy himself indicates he was not literally Elijah and of course Moses as I point out now John the Baptist did have an Elijah type ministry he appeared on the scene suddenly and even dressed like Elijah he sought to turn the people back to God as Elijah did in his way this gives me an excuse to mention a legend the legend that he's wearing Elijah's mantle there's a there's a Jewish legend that I never took seriously except I've discovered a few things might have made it possible but we still know it's true that he's actually wearing Elijah's mantle and so now Malachi had predicted that Elijah would return before messiahs coming and he may still do that that may be what's going on in revelation 11 so so they made people speculate that John wasn't lied you literally who art thou that we may give an answer then at sentence what say if I was myself he said I am the voice of one crying in the wilderness make straight the way of the Lord as the Prophet I said the Prophet he's quoting I'd say a 40 verse 3 by the light and prepare you either way the Lord make straight in the desert a highway for God John that this is quoting the Old Testament is next his role he's not one of those three guys he is got a mission of his own okay and they which were sent were of the Pharisees and he asked him said any why baptize us now then if thou be not that Christ your lives neither property not one of those three guys were you doing baptizing this question now the Pharisees are numbered about six thousand they were very influential and they held a very strict interpretation of the law and they also embraced many oral traditions in addition those oral traditions later get documented in the 3rd century AD 3rd through the 8th into what's called the Talmud trying to document what they call the Oral Law and they were the Pharisees are the only minor group that survived the huge war of 66 70 AD and the teaching has formed the basis of Tombo Judaism I said - I know something i baptize with water but they're staying with one among you whom you know not he it is who coming after me is preferred before me who is shoes like it I am not worthy to unloose now this is where I'm going to send you off on your own little side trip you might want to go and study the shoes throughout the Scriptures I really you can take one of these things and run with it you'll discover something interesting it seems that the Holy Spirit uses these idioms consistently when you talk about Exodus or talking choose the burning bush what God tells Moses to do take off your shoes you're on hallowed ground right and when he gets the Ten Commandments in Exodus 19 and then Joshua 40 years later one night after there gets confronted any challenge is this stranger like a century and the Sanders says take off your shoes your holy ground and Joshua realizes who it is the Lord Jesus Josh would invite the ballot Jericho Jesus did the last verses of chapter 5 we had carefully you'll discover that every rule in the Torah was violated the Battle of Jericho it becomes a model a structural model of the book of Revelation another whole study to get into in the rows and bow has that shoe became a marriage license in that whole clot scheme and of course Guiana Baptists respect here thus is an echo of all of those in my mind so you can chase them down on your own all these things are done in Bethabara beyond Jordan we've done as Beth does that's a spot on the Jordan just opposite Jericho and you now today can baptize there because there's a deal with the jar of your garden government and we do our groups there now just recently because that's a regular has been made with Jordan and so it's a it's a more pleasant place than is usually used which is a we get them all here anyway that's it you can actually baptize there to choose to end is Bethabara which means the house of passage that's where Joshua first came across you'll get all that the next day John seeth Jesus coming to him and said behold the lamb of God which taketh away the sin world here is John's public introduction first introduction coming of Lord Jesus Christ and he uses a very Jewish label here behold the lamb of God and this is a it's interesting every one of the feasts of Israel or seven of them are pregnant with prophecy issues as well as historical memorabilia they all have historical reasons but they also have a prophetic role that is it's very great study to get into and when you study the abraham's offering of isaac a neighbor isaac are going up the hill like injustice 22 and the kids is where we got the Woodman where's that where's the layman Abraham says in verse 8 there my son God will provide himself a lamb for a burnt offering most people pick up that Abraham knew he was acting out a prophecy because he names the place in the mountain Lord shall be seen and two thousand years later on that very spot another father would offer his son as an offering for sin and it's interesting that the Lamb of God is idiomatic land of Passover and of the the atoning death of Christ and so by the way this also proves that Cain was wrong and Abel was right at Abel and what not a lamb in accordance to God's instruction you got as a whole background there that you wanted to get into verse 30 this is he of whom I said after me come with a man which is preferred before me for he was before me I knew him not but that he should be made manifest to Israel therefore and I come baptizing with water and in John 16 he doesn't get the detail the like marking the others about this whole event but he doesn't mention I saw the spirit descending from heaven like a dove and it abode upon him and I knew him not but he that sent me to baptize with water the same said unto me upon whom thou shalt see the spirit descending and remaining on him the same as he which baptizeth with the Holy Ghost and so come like a dub verse 34 I saw that bear record that this is the son of God and this is one of the places that the Trinity is visible because Jesus is there obviously the Holy Spirit descending on light not a not a dove but like a dove and the voice of the father says this is my beloved Son in whom I'm well pleased so all three are manifested in that event and again the next day after John stood and to his disciples and looking upon Jesus he walked with he saith behold the lamb of God and he does it again see and the two disciples heard him speak and they followed Jesus and then Jesus turned and saw them following and said oven what's iki he said unto Him rabbi which is to be interpreted meaning master where dwellest out said come and see they came and saw where he dwelt peopled with him that day for it was about the tenth hour one of the two which heard John speak John that speak it is and followed him was Andrew simon Peters brother he first findeth his own brother Simon and saith unto Him we have found the Messiah which is being interpret Christ in Zion if you now Andrew is one of the two disciples who follow Jesus he's the first proclaimer of Jesus in his eye in gospel and here's two more times both times he's always bringing someone to Jesus you gotta that's why people like to adopt that you know Andrew is a ministry or label themselves and the unnamed disciple here is commonly held to be John the son of Zebedee the author of this gospel he doesn't mention himself but that's just a form of humility John the son of Zebedee who's a brother of James also sensitivity obviously and altar disgustful so he's the unnamed cycle here that there are two pairs of brothers Simon and Andrew and James and John sons of Zebedee these four are fishermen there were at least seven of the disciples that were fishermen by the way before we're through here and he brought him to Jesus and when Jesus be already said that word Simon the son of Jonah thou shalt be called Cephas which is by interpretation a stone and so Cephas is the aramaic if you will because jesus knew his character and Peter is the Greek translation of Cephas which means rock Cephas is his name in the Arab League but the aramaic means rock and that's where you get Peter Peters the Greek rendering of rod that was anyway Simon's name in Hebrew was probably Simeon incidentally the day following Jesus would go forth into Galilee and findeth Philip and sathan and follow me and Philip was of the theta the city of Andrew and Peter so this is a whole collection of Galileans there's only one that wasn't a Galilean Judas Iscariot though the first disciples were from Galilee Jesus called me he called the front galley but he called him in Judea when it was John the Baptist but he's heading up north if you will it's on his way to the gallery they called Philip to be a disciple and his hometown miss would say they was on the northeast corner of the Sea of Galilee and enter Peter of course both born there and then he findeth Nathanael and saith and we have found him of whom Moses in the law and the prophets did write Jesus of Nazareth the son of Joseph and attention it develops testimony to stress that he is the promised one of the text and you track goes down if you like the text word is emphasized and then the value said of him came there any good thing come out of Nazareth that's a apparently a proverb of the day there are actually two prophets that did come out of out of that area but that's in the in their field say venom he says can't even good thing come out of Nazareth come and negative you till just come and see doesn't heads rooms is come check it out and Jesus saw Nathanael coming down and saith of him behold an Israelite indeed in whom is no guile they said of him whence knowest thou me DS engine sent him before that Philip called thee when thou wast under the fig tree I saw thee then felt like much to us man it sure shook him up Nathanael answered and said of him rabbi thou art the Son of God thou art the king of Israel apparently the van you was meditating on his own thought he was blown hey jesus knew that infected he knew that blew the definite process but it certainly present value and he knew the facts here and it goes on here then with you you know it's interesting there were times that the crowds wanted to make his king but he refused him in John 6 we'll see that happen he did present himself as a king in John 12 and the affirmed a pilot that he was born a king and when we won here because the Fanueil learns that that early is the point on Sunday he answered and said of them because I said unto the I saw the under fig tree believes thou but thou shalt see greater things than these and he said that very various and he hereafter ye shall see heaven open and the angels of God ascending and descending upon the Son of man Wow and so by the way one of things we realize as we go through John John will assume that his readers are familiar with the synoptic Gospels mark looking at Matthew Mark and Luke and they each record the Transfiguration John makes a reference to it that was one of them just now and there's a couple places where he alludes to it but he takes for granted his readers are familiar with that so we want to take a short detour and take a look at this for a minute here is this was his mark Lee at the end of that chapter was apparently prophecy of the Transfiguration which was at Matthew 17 mark 9 and Luke 9 and it's my perception that the Transfiguration decides being a Transfiguration of the Christ is a stefanini because they have a discussion going on that we can infer from the writings of the guys that were present there okay and it's a very provocative attendance list in this meeting the two witnesses revelation will impact on all of this so when we talk about this very there are three expected the Messiah Elijah and Moses from the commit from the text and John the app says he's not none of those there were two ministries that were unfinished Moses's ministry was interrupted by the refere demon that is misbehavior there that then numbers 20 and counted around three Elijah was caught up as it was translated and Elijah had eight miracles Elijah followed him around wanted a double portion and if you study the license thing he did 16 so apparently God is dumb abortion but everybody speculates about the two witnesses in revelation 11 they all figure it's Enoch and Elijah because they didn't die it was translated except there's a problem I take the view that couldn't be Elijah you know it isn't necessarily Enoch everybody says it has to be Enoch because of Hebrews 9:27 is appointed unto man once to die and after this the judgment that's the jet that's a rebuttal of the incarnation and that's there are exceptions to that though and it's a general on that exception there are exceptions Lazarus in John 11 is an exception he died twice G Iris's daughter in mark 5 nor gate the widow remain son in Luke 7 these are people there others too that were raised from the dead doesn't mean they have the resurrection body they were raised from the dead is a technical difference and so the the Hebrews 9:27 doesn't require the witnesses to be inactive he will and furthermore Enoch really wasn't Jewish she was pre Abraham in the first place and both of witnesses are witnesses of Israel and so the they are identified in revelation 11 by unique powers and the miracles they can do Elijah had was unique and he does fire from heaven and heaven with with laying for sweet for three and a half years which doesn't come out in the Old Testament text but is mentioned twice by James and Jesus himself in the New Testament so you put that together it really does fit and then Moses of course turns water into blood which is described and also all manner of plagues so the for definitive gifts that these guys enjoyed in revelation 11 are unique to both Elijah and Moses doesn't mean this is correct this is why some of us believe that the two will be Moses and Elijah and so and that also unlocks starts to deal with another mystery why on earth did Michael contend with Satan over the body Moses what's all that about nobody knows it's a strange illusion in the book of Jude so was this a staff meeting during the Transfiguration I suspect it was who was present Moses and Elijah was president so I'm getting into this year and the subjects they discussed included Jesus spoke of his crucifixion Luke tells us in Luke chapter 9 that was discussed their sufferings in glory were a subject of discussion from first Peter 1 and his second coming is a subject of discussion in 2nd Peter 1 Peter makes reference to those things they're just hints but from that we infer these things discussion going on with Jesus of course being transfigured and Moses and Elijah who are present so the there's another interesting thing about location the only guy that I found to do and that picked up on this was dead what more head of firefighter for Christ we were close friends he's not with the Lord knows the truth I'd love to know what it is he is the mountain of the fence making it the same location that Moses uh Parker and Elijah or took place could very well be Elijah's translation is across the Jordan just east of Jericho apparently Moses uh procore is a bet they are at the base of Mount Nebo apparently and the Transfiguration we know is not in Galilee a lot of traditional sites that people talk about are not correct does that mean this one is correct no no but it's provocative it kind of interesting that will happen it does some geographic you see so we just made it - believe it or not I didn't so we've completed chapter 1 and it took us two sessions to do that that will not be our typical practice will normally go about a chapter a week going through with very only one or two difficulties it might take a split session so but I want you for next time to study John chapter 2 and in that you'll find a couple of topics one of which of course is the wedding at Cana and so we'll learn a little bit about that there are two events there the changing of the water to wine why did John pick that one that miracle first and it happened on the third day what third day what is that all about how is that significant and what is distinctive about the water that was used everybody talks of water being wine pay attention as to what water was used and see if you can do some homework on that and we'll try to unravel at because that will take you into the whole issue of the red heifer and all that that most people overlook and we'll let that go the second event they will also conclude the next session will be the cleansing of the temple and that has implications for all there's some lessons in that for us also so that's your thing for next time let's stand for a closing word prayer father we just praise you we thank you for this chapter we thank you for your word we we just pray that through your Holy Spirit you would help us apprehend what these metaphors really include we thank you Father for your word we thank you for its death but we also thank you Father for the practical lessons we pray father through your Holy Spirit you would help us to apply these insights understandings to our walk everyday as we commit ourselves indeed without any reservations whatsoever into your hands and the name of Yeshua HaMashiach the Lord Jesus our coming King indeed amen [Music] you

Channel: Emmaus Road

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Keywords: Gospel of John, John, Gospel, Chuck Missler, Chuck, New Testament, Koinonia House, Jesus, Jesus Christ, Messiah, Yeshua, Apostles, The Two Winesses, Salvation, Jerusalem, Galilee, John the Baptist, Baptism, Church, Holy Spirit, Dove, Son of God, Son of man, Lamb of God, I AM, Bread of Life, Bread from heaven, Saint John, St John

Id: 9hVHRmoQ-js

Length: 60min 43sec (3643 seconds)

Published: Wed Jul 12 2017