The Healing at the Pool on the Sabbath Pt 2

Open your Bibles to John chapter 5, please. John chapter 5. I appreciate your singing. I appreciate the ministry of the ladies that minister to the children with the children's choir. I came home this week, and it was about dinner time, so they were already at the table, and I heard Silas leading the children, and I think, holy, holy, holy, the youngest one was doing the highest part, the oldest one doing the lowest part, and it was just wonderful.

I knew how to throw a really good spiral when I was that age. I didn't know anything about singing, and so I appreciate the ministry here at the church with the ministry of singing. So we're in John chapter 5. I'll read from verses 18 to 29. John chapter 5, verse 18. This was why the Jews were seeking all the more to kill Jesus.

Because not only was he breaking the Sabbath, but he was even calling God his own father, making himself equal with God. So Jesus said to them, truly, truly, I say to you, the son can do nothing of his own accord, but only what he sees the father doing. For whatever the father does, the son does likewise. For the Father loves the Son and shows him all that he himself is doing.

And greater works than these will he show him, so that you may marvel. For as the Father raises the dead and gives them life, so also the Son gives life to whom he will. For the Father judges no one, but has given all judgment to the Son, that all may honor the Son, just as they honor the Father. Whoever does not honor the Son does not honor the Father who sent him.

Truly, truly, I say to you, whoever hears my word and believes him who sent me has eternal life. He does not come into judgment, but has passed from death to life. Truly, truly, I say to you, an hour is coming and is now here when the dead will hear the voice of the Son of God and those who hear will live. for as the father has life in himself so he has granted the son also to have life in himself and he has given him authority to execute judgment because he is the son of man so do not marvel at this for an hour is coming when all who are in the tombs will hear his voice and come out those who have done good to the resurrection of life and those who have done evil to the resurrection of the judgment let us pray oh father I pray that you would help us in this hour to receive your word and to receive it as the authority that it bears that is your word and that you would help it to be a means of grace in our lives.

For those who do not know you or believed upon you, may they repent even this morning and believe upon you as they see Jesus Christ and his ministry as the Son of God and as judge. and I pray God that for your people as they hear your word they would respond and again repentance and belief upon Jesus for growth and righteousness. Lord we're so thankful that you have very good things laid up for those who love you and so I pray God that you would help me to speak truth here and I pray God that you would help the people to listen and hear and to have the spirit work powerfully in them to respond in faith. God in heaven help us to see Jesus as he is, who he is.

He is truly the son of God who has offered life to those who look upon him. And so let us celebrate that life now together in Jesus name. Amen. Well, I think we've all been there before of when we are in communication and conversating, conversing with others, and it just doesn't seem to go well. It's a disagreement of such. You think of a conversation between a parent and a child, the child perhaps is not keeping his room or her room clean and tidy.

And so the child retorts after the parent corrects the child. The child retorts that she has way more chores than her little siblings, just doesn't have time to clean her room. The conversation moves then to the nature of age and proper workload given that age. And the child then complains of her little siblings having too much time and bugging her when she does have free time.

And then so the conversation continues on as you respond that she had time when she was that age, and she responds that she doesn't nearly have as much fun things to play with back then as her siblings do. And we see that the conversation went from something of a main problem and had many bunny trails and off trails off of it that then the conversation went down. Perhaps, again, the child not cleaning their room is a sign of laziness and not seeing that her work is to the glory of God's name.

There's joy to be had in there, and that's where the conversation should have settled. But because of the disagreement going on and on in different directions, that totally got lost in all these different conversations. And if you look at different disagreements and hardships you may have with whether it's a friend or a sibling or a spouse, you could see in those disagreements and those arguments that they start with the main trail, but then they go off into these rabbit trails and you lose track of the main point of the whole argument And therefore it doesn edify anyone But Jesus doesn have that problem here He is in an argument with the religious leaders the Jewish leaders of the day.

He is in an argument with them. You see, he healed a man at the pool, and he chose to do it on a Sabbath day. And the religious leaders respond by saying, you have broken the Sabbath day by healing this man. And if you remember, Jesus does not get caught up in bunny trails and side trails and loses track of the main problem, the main thing that's going on.

Instead, Jesus, like a master, makes a comment that brings everything to where it needs to be. And we saw that comment in chapter 5, verse 17, when he says, my father is working till now, and so I work. And what Jesus is doing here is the problem that's going on in the whole setting is not whether or not what the proper use of the Sabbath day is. That's a nice bunny trail that you could spend a lot of time on, but it's not going to get to the heart of the issue that's happening between Jesus and these religious leaders.

The heart of the issue between these two groups is that they do not believe that Jesus is truly the Son of God. And so instead of getting lost in the bunny trail of proper Sabbath keeping, which sometimes Jesus does talk about in the other Gospels, he gets to the heart of the argument, the heart of the matter, when he says that as the Father is working, so I work. And we see that the Jewish leaders understood by that comment that he was making himself equal with the Father.

He was calling him Father, and he's saying that the only one who has the right to work on the Sabbath is God because he needs to maintain his creation. And he's saying, I need to do the same thing as God and maintain creation and recreation or salvation, which that healing revealed. And so they properly, the Jewish leaders, properly understood that he is making himself out to be God.

And so there is where Jesus wants the conversation to be. Not on proper Sabbath keeping in which they were legalistic in the way they approached that, but who is Jesus as the Son of God? And that is the conversation or that is the teaching Jesus is going to now get into in light of this healing at the pool, and he's going to show us who he is as truly the Son of God, who he is as truly the judge of the world and what that means for people like you and me and the religious leaders.

And so as we approach the text in verse 19, we have to remember that background. He centered it on the Son of God, who he is. And they, the religious leaders, assume he's making himself out to be a God and so therefore opposed to the true God. and Jesus is saying, I am the Son of God in unity with the true God, and then he's going to go from there about what that means, again, for me and you, for the religious leaders.

So look at the unity Jesus claims to have with God as the Son of God. Look at verse 19. So Jesus said to them, truly, truly, I say to you, the Son can do nothing of his own, and the ESV says accord, but really there is no accord. It's just of his own. The son can do nothing of his own, but he can only do what he sees the father doing. For whatever the father does, that the son does likewise.

You see, back in the ancient world, to have different gods is to have gods opposed to one another. The Jewish one god was opposed to the pagan many gods around. You cannot have the gods of the pagan lands and the God of Yahweh being in unity with one another. For there was no unity, there was only strife. And so when the Jewish leaders saw him, Jesus claimed to be God, they automatically assume opposition.

But here Jesus is saying, I am the son of God in full unity with God. And that's what he claims when he says, I could do nothing of my own, but only what I see or receive from the father as reveals to me. You see, Jesus, as the son of God on earth, only ever did what was pleasing to the father. A far cry from being in being opposition to the father or the true God above.

He only ever did what the God above wanted him to do. And in fact, this relationship was mutual. And when he says in verse 20, for the father loves the son and shows him all that he himself is doing. So you see, there's that relationship. The father has an affection for the son. You think of opposing gods, there's no affection there.

There's only there's only conflict. And so he's correcting the Jewish leader. And he said, I am the son of God, but I am in unity with him. The father loves me and therefore reveals everything to me. And he says, and then as I receive that and understand that, then I do it. And so what we need to see here is the complete unity Jesus has with the Father.

And in fact, that is what it means. He is eternally the Son of God and took on flesh and has this relationship with the Father. As everything he does is pleasing to the Father, as the Father in love reveals himself to Jesus. So you see that relationship between the two as Jesus acts. By the way, this is supposed to be the way we operate too. Now, we're not eternally the son of God, but we are in light of Jesus, who is eternal God, took on flesh.

He then gives us our life, and our life should actually reflect this. If you remember in Luke, in the genealogy, it's very fascinating. When Luke identifies Adam he calls him the son of God So Adam wasn the eternal son of God but he was a created son of God here on earth And he was supposed to have this sort of relationship with God the Father That is, God the Father in love revealing himself to Adam, and Adam in love to the Father doing all things that he has been revealed to him.

But we know that Adam failed miserably, right? Adam failed miserably, and instead of having that relationship with the Father, He has a relationship with Satan in which he becomes his representative instead. And so what happens is the Son of God from eternity past takes on flesh and then has this relationship with the Father and is always in keeping with this relationship.

The Father loves the Son and reveals all things to him and the Son acts accordingly. And then, so we know that our life is supposed to then be, is found here. and that everything that the Father reveals to us, we then, in response, do on earth. And so this is what it means to be in unity with the Father. This is what it means to not be opposed to God, but instead be doing everything that the Father is revealing to him.

And we know that this is the purpose of our own very lives, that we look upon Jesus and receive this point of our life as well too, that the Father would reveal things to us as a follower of Christ, and then we would act accordingly, we would do around what he has revealed for us to do. And so going back to the purpose, the main point of this text, is that when the Jewish leaders tell him that you are opposed to God by claiming to be God, Jesus says, on the contrary, I can do nothing but of what God has revealed to me. And since he loves me, he reveals everything to me.

And since he reveals everything, all things to him, he says going on in verse 20, and greater works than these will he show him, that is the son of God to me, so that you may marvel. You see, the works that he's referring to is the work by the pool in which he healed the person by the pool. That was a work that testified to the father revealing to the son and the son doing.

That work was associated with that. but he's saying that I'm going to do more works than that. There is great marveling, astonishment happening at what happened at the pool. There's going to be greater works than this in the future. There's more to come, Jesus is saying. As the Father reveals more to me and I do what the Father wills, there is more to come.

And what is that? Well, what he gets to, you see, if all he ever did was just heal some people, it'd be astonishing he would amaze some people he might be written in some of the history books there's this man who did kind of crazy things he healed people of their blindness people who couldn't walk if that was all the works he ever did he might make it into the history books a little bit but Jesus wasn't here those things were pointed to something greater greater works that he was going to do that has implications for all of humanity including us, including me and you, and even the religious leaders that were listening to him. Well, what are those greater works?

Well, look what he goes on to say in verse 21. For as the Father raises the dead and gives them life, so also the Son gives life to whom he wills. You see, what we have in the first half of John are seven works of Jesus, miracles that attest to him being the Son of God. And that seventh one in the first half of the Bible is going to be when he raises Lazarus from the dead to life.

When he calls out Lazarus from the tomb to have him walk again. And what Jesus is saying is that there's a greater work that he is revealing to me that I'm going to do when I raise the dead from death to life. And the only one who can do that of themselves is God himself. And so he's pointing to a greater work. you think healing is something, well wait until I bring from death to life.

Because no one could do that but God alone. Where something is completely no life and then life comes. We need to remember to marvel at the beginning of the Bible. We need to remember to marvel at the power of God on display that there was void and chaos and darkness and then he said let there be light and it goes on and on and on until all of life is surrounding, all of life is present in the week one of creation.

That is something only God and deity can do, and it's a powerful work indeed. And Jesus says, as God raises the dead and gives life, or brings life where there is none, so the Son of God does as well, so I do as well, revealing who he is as the Son of God. But it doesn't stop there. So you see the greater works going on here, right? We have the healing at the pool, and he says there's going to be something greater when I raise the dead, because only God can do that, as he's talking to the Jewish leaders.

But then that points to even greater work that the Son of God will do, and we see that in verse 21 or 22 when he says, For the Father judges no one, but has given all judgment to the Son. And so that's kind of the progression there, right? they're saying, you're claiming to be God. How dare you? And Jesus says, more or less, I am the son of God. You see it there at the pool.

You're going to see it when I raise the dead to life. And you're going to see it as the very judge of the universe. You see, one of the things that we often don't consider is that Jesus's ability to raise the dead to life, you know, like, let me say it this way. when we look at the story of Lazarus and John we we see Jesus's ability to bring someone from death to life and we think wow he can bring me from death spiritually to life spiritually and that a true statement and we should take that and meditate on that and celebrate that But there something being said directly in this text here that Jesus ability to bring the dead and make them stand up to life and to come to him is revealing his ability to call everyone from their tombs to come to him and be judged by him.

And a lot of times we don't consider that with Lazarus. We don't consider that. Jesus is revealing his ability to call everyone from the tombs to be judged by him but he has that power as true god as the son of god and so jesus is he's saying here the greater works ultimately is revealed that i am the judge of the universe now imagine how insane that is the jewish leaders who are the judges over the nation accuses him of claiming equality with God and Jesus says, you haven't seen anything yet.

I am your judge. We know how this is. We know the feeling of the idea of being judged and judgment itself, how that's the final end of everything. Think about, and we get a taste of that throughout our growing up, think about in your family unit, Who was the judge in your family unit? Your father, right? And so when you got in trouble, you didn't get punished by your siblings.

You went to your father himself. The death that you received of the spanking and the grounding and the punishments came from your father. And the life indeed, too. Life was found with your father as he praised you for your good work or he gave you your allowances and everything. So we have an understanding of this concept of the greater work of a judge and the life and death coming forth from that.

Or how about, do you think about your family? What about school? You remember school. Who was the judge in school? It was the principal, right? If you got in trouble, enough trouble, who would you go to?

You wouldn't go to your classmates. You wouldn't go to even the teacher. You would go to the principal itself, right? I remember eighth grade, I got in a fight. Ninth grade, tenth grade, eleventh grade, twelfth grade, I skipped too much. And so whenever it got really bad, I went to the principal.

That was the final judge who would bring about death or punishment to me. And whenever I walked and graduated, whose hand did you shake whenever you received that diploma? That life. You shook the hand of the principal. Or at least I think you do. I believe that was who it was.

It was the principal there. So the point is that we understand, you know, at different phases of our life, the idea of judgment, the final authority, The one who gives us life or gives us death in that realm, in that realm of things. They just got attacked. Or how about the government itself? You get out of school, you become an adult, right? And if you break the rules and the laws, who are you going to face?

The judge. And he has the power to give you death, punishment, or to give you life, freedom. We get this concept of this final authority, this final thing being the judge. And this is what Jesus, he's saying, but he is the judge of everything. He's not limited. His jurisdiction isn't a circle around a certain area.

He is judge over all. He is judge over your entire being, over your body and your soul. And his left hand holds your body and your right hand holds your soul. He judges it all. And so this is what he's saying about himself as the true son of God, as God himself. He says, you have seen nothing yet.

The works I do will attest to the fact that I am the final judge of all, over your soul, over your body, over everything of yours. He says in verse 22, for the Father judges no one, but has given all judgment to the Son. So what's the purpose of this, right? As he's talking to the religious leaders, as he's talking to us in Scripture, what's the point of this so what's the point of of the nature of who he is the son of god revealing himself as the final judge well the point is is that this is what we're supposed to do in verse 22 for the uh verse 23 that all may honor the son just as they honor the father whoever does not honor the son does not honor the father who sent him so what's the end of it What's the purpose of this?

It's that Jesus would be honored as the judge of your entire being. Now again, remember the context of where we're at with the religious leader saying, accusing, how dare you say you are God, we want to kill you. And Jesus then flips the script and says, you are to honor me if you are not to be judged by me in the end. And it's the same thing for us now. we are to look to Christ not as a good teacher, not as a kind and cuddly person, not as all these limited things that the world tells us who Jesus is, but Jesus is judge of all and is to be honored to the utmost, to the fullest degree because of who he is as son of God.

And to do anything less than full honor and glory is to defame him, is to commit a sin that leads to death. He says, all are to honor me. As he's talking to these religious leaders. What does it look like then to honor Jesus now? What does it look like to honor Christ now? And this is what we need to marvel and be amazed at.

Because again, we're talking about, this is in the context of life and death. This is in the context of a judge who decides judgment or or to be free from judgment and life. And what's amazing is he's talking to those religious leaders, and he's telling them that in order to honor him now, it looks like something particular right now, and it looks like in verse 24.

Truly, truly, I say to you, whoever hears my word and believes him who sent me has eternal life. He does not come into judgment, but has passed from death to life. So you notice how Jesus talks about the final judgment, at least that's the context, but then he says that there is a way that you can escape that right now by honoring him, by believing upon his word, and receiving him now.

See, it's interesting that the way that we can honor Jesus now as the Son of God is to believe upon him and receive help from him so that we do not receive judgment and death from him. Everyone else that we have dishonored that we are to honor, we will receive death and punishment for sure. But the Son of God, who is the greatest judge of all, comes and he says, Honor me now by believing upon me and receiving help and life from me.

And that's what he says in verse 24. He says, the way that you honor me specifically now is to believe upon my word and have life. That is to escape my judgment. And again, he's talking to these religious leaders who want to kill him, who oppose him. And he's saying, you must honor me, and by honoring me, believe upon my word and be saved. And it's the same message that we have ourselves.

What does it mean to honor the judge who is to one day judge all things, our body and soul and everything? It is to receive the help that he's offered by his word. His word tells us that we are sinners. His word tells us that we are dead in our sins. His word tells us that we are not righteous, that our misery is found in our sin. But his word also tells us that the Son of God took on flesh to be our help, to die for our sins and rise again for our life.

And he says, you want to honor me? You want to escape judgment that you rightfully deserve. Believe upon my word. Receive life from me. For this is why he came at the first. And so here at the end of verse 24, we have this invitation from Jesus as the son of God, as truly the son of God.

He says he is the judge. That's what the works amount to. but yet there is an offer of help. Believe upon him and you will pass from death unto life. And then moving forward though, he kind of repeats the same theme, but he kind of goes off of the human responsibility for you to believe. And he goes on the sheer power of the Son of God to call a dead people unto spiritual life right now.

And he says that, look at verse 25, truly, truly, I say to you, an hour is coming and is now here when the dead will hear the voice of the Son of God and those who hear will live. You see, now he's going from the judgment in the final and now he's talking about that there is a life that he gives now by his sheer power when he says that an hour has come and is now here when the dead will hear the voice of the Son of God and those who hear will live when he saying that he has power in himself to cause dead people to go from deadness to lifeness To go from inability to hear and listen and to receive any life at all to having a soft heart to responding to life indeed by his work on the cross and resurrection. And so notice how he goes from placing the human responsibility on his listeners and on us that you must respond to the call and now he says the work of the Son of God is to be a powerful force in which I break through any deadness at all and bring you unto life.

There is this kind of tension in scripture of the powerful work of the son of God to break through deadness and bring to life. And there's this human responsibility of responding to that to that call for life indeed. And here's this tension before us here, right? He just talked about human responsibility and now he's talking about the sheer power of the son of God to break through death and to bring unto life.

And again, this is all part of the powerful work of Jesus as the Son of God, that he's able to bring people from their deadness unto life indeed. And for those who have responded, for us who have been overcome by this powerful work of the Son of God to go from deadness to life, we ask, how can this be? How is it possible that my deadness, my sin, that my brokenness, my complete separation from God in which I felt within my very soul, had no desire from nothing for him.

How can that be broken by the Son of God? And he says in verse 26 how that is possible. He says, for as the Father has life in himself, so he has granted the Son also to have life in himself. And so that is the point that Jesus is getting at, is that he is truly God with the Father. And he has this power of life of himself that only God can have. And he can impart that upon his people even now to bring them from a separation from God to bring them near to God.

This is the life that Jesus has. And then he concludes this display of the authority, the power of who Jesus is as the Son of God. he concludes it by then pointing back to the final judgment when he says in verse 28 and 29, he says, do not marvel at this for an hour is coming when all who are in the tombs will hear his voice and come out and those who have done good to the resurrection of life and those who have done evil to the resurrection of judgment. And so there again, the same themes of judgment as he has judged, but also the same things of his ability to bring the dead up out of their tombs to give them that judgment.

But notice the focus is on what are you doing now in light of that. Notice what he says, that those who go to the resurrection of life is because they did good. And notice that those who go to the resurrection of judgment is because they have done evil. And so Jesus is pointing all things as the son of God And he saying that I will be the final judge And he saying that at that day I will bring you to judgment to eternal damnation or I bring you to life And what you do now matters in light of that final reality That if you do good now, you will receive life in that final reality.

Those who do wicked and evil now will receive death or judgment in that final reality. And so then we've got to ask ourselves once more, what does it mean to do good now? What does it mean to do evil now? And we must then remember what he's already told us, what he's already told the Jewish leaders. To do good is to honor him, and to honor him means to repent of your sins and believe upon him for salvation and then follow and obey him now.

And we can get it very mixed up. There's like two different ways we can mix this up. There's the one way in which it says this easy believism where all we have to do is walk down an aisle and say a prayer and then we're saved and it doesn't matter how we live afterward. And I want you to notice that Jesus says that judgment is coming and those who have done good to resurrection of life and those who have done evil to resurrection of judgment.

The point is if you live your life doing wicked and evil deeds, you will receive hell no matter what kind of magical prayer that you said. But then we don't want to fall on the other side where we think that, well, in order for me to do good and receive heaven, I have to do all these good works in the law of Christ. Remember, what honors Christ is that he has given us his word, which is the gospel for you to believe upon, respond, and live for him according to his power that he displays in you.

And to do evil is to ignore this help from the Son of God. To do evil is to ignore the displays of his power as the Son of God. To do evil is what the religious leaders were doing now. Instead of seeing him as true God, as the Son of God, with full power and ability as judge to both save and to condemn, they see him as an imposter. And so their wicked deeds are revealed and their lack of belief upon him in that moment.

And so Jesus is saying, no, I am the Son of God. I am true God. I am able to do these works of salvation on the Sabbath because I am the Son of God. And he says that this work here reveals that at the pool. It'll be more revealed when I bring up the dead to life. It'll be finally revealed when I judge over your very soul in the end.

And he calls on the people around him then, and he calls on us now that we would repent of our sins and truly see him as what he claims to be and rely upon him for life indeed. and so the question we need to ask ourselves as we settle in on that truth is are we believing upon jesus according to what he's claimed to be is he truly in your eyes and estimation the son of god full of authority and power over your life do you truly see him as someone who holds your soul and your body in his very hands if you have that understanding you will say oh wretched man that i for not honoring him. And that when you seek and you find him in his word that is a word of grace and mercy to you to be saved from your sins and to be able to follow him in righteousness For not only is he judged, but he's help for you even today to be believed upon and to receive the help needed to walk righteously, to do good, and to receive eternal life in the end. Let us pray.

Oh, Father, thank you for Jesus Christ the Lord. I thank you God that he did not his ability to get to the heart of the matter God in heaven we see the disbelief of the religious leaders at that time and we know that same spirit of disbelief is in our own age and we know that it's in our own heart that we would deny the very nature of who Jesus is as son of God and so denying that we would then live wickedly and sinfully and receive the judgment from this Son of God. So I pray, O God, that we would believe upon his word.

We would believe that he is the authority, that all things are bound up in him, and we would then obey him as he has revealed himself in his word. We would say our only hope is to believe upon his great work of sacrificial love in which he died for us to give us that help needed so that we would go from bad to good, from death to life, to working against God, sinning as sinners, to rather, with softened hearts by the power of the Son of God, to walk in obedience because of his grace. So we thank you for this help that's available for us today.

I pray, Lord, for those who have never believed upon Jesus. Oh, Lord, would you cause them to turn from their sin now? Would you help them to see truly that he is the judge of all? He's the judge of their own souls. Would you help them to see that their misery is amounted to the fact that they have denied and rejected and ignored this Savior? Would you cause them to see that he calls on them to honor him, and that honoring is found in believing upon the gospel and being saved?

And I pray, God, that you would remind the saints of this very thing. We can so easily fall out of looking to Jesus and trusting upon him. We can rely upon our own works, or we can just grow lazy and negligent. I pray Lord that you would help us to instead put our eyes afresh on Jesus Christ the judge of all and know that this judge has done wonderful things for us that we would not be condemned in the end but rather we would have life and that life begins now as we turn away from our sin and enjoy Jesus Christ forever so would you help us to respond to this in faith would you let this cause us to enable us to walk with Christ in righteousness.

Lord, would you reveal the different sins in our lives and would you cause us to see Jesus in light of those sins as a helper and the enabler to walk righteously instead. Oh Lord, I pray you would help us now. Be a means to us for our salvation or put the means of salvation before our very eyes and hearts whether it's the word or now with the Lord's Supper.

Help us to see Jesus afresh. In Jesus' name, amen. Thank you.