In this week's episode of The Defender Bible Study, we kick off the new year by delving into the powerful revelations of John chapter 5. Join Chris Johnson as he explores the profound claims of Jesus about His deity and equality with God. This chapter not only challenges the religious leaders of the time but also invites us to examine our own understanding of who Jesus is.
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The mission of Lifeline Children’s Services is to equip the Body of Christ to manifest the gospel to vulnerable children. Our vision is for vulnerable children and their communities to be transformed by the gospel and to make disciples.
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Guest
Pastor Chris Johnson
Chris joined Lifeline in March, 2020, and serves as the Sr. Director of Church Partnerships & External Advocacy. He previously served as a pastor for 24 years and as the Executive Director of the Kentucky Governor’s Office of Faith and Community Based Initiatives. Chris has also served as a consultant and has been a frequent speaker at local, state, and national conferences, churches, and community gatherings, sharing his family’s story and challenging others to answer the gospel call to care for vulnerable children and families. He was born and raised in metro Atlanta, GA, and currently lives in Birmingham. Chris studied Church Ministries (B.A.) at Trinity Baptist College and Educational Leadership (M.Ed.) at Regent University. He and his amazing wife, Alicia, have 10 children (7 adopted from foster care) and 3 grandchildren (2 adopted from foster care). They have also served as foster parents to more than 40 children.
What is The Defender Bible Study?
The Defender Bible Study is a weekly study of God’s Word as we seek to equip the Body of Christ to manifest the gospel to orphans and vulnerable children. This podcast is a ministry of Lifeline Children's Services.
Welcome to the defender bible study. A weekly encouragement to equip the body of Christ through the study of scripture and prayer to manifest the gospel to orphans and vulnerable children around the world. This podcast
Chris Johnson:Welcome to the defender bible study podcast. Today is Monday, January 6, 2025. This is our first recording of the new year. My name is Chris Johnson. I serve as the senior director of church partnerships and external advocacy here at Lifeline Children Services.
Chris Johnson:Today, we're gonna be continuing our study in the book of John, walking through verse by verse through the book of John. Today, we're looking at John chapter number 5 verses 30 through 47. So the end of the chapter here, chapter number 5, it's good to be back in this book of John. It's good to be able to study the life of Christ and, just be able to see who Christ is. Really John chapter 5, which we've been looking at over the last few weeks, is all about Jesus as deity.
Chris Johnson:It's really kind of an apologetic chapter in the Bible. Jesus is claiming to be equal with God. Now we've seen Jesus do a few miracles, but most everything has been somewhat private. Well, in chapter 5, things really start getting interesting. It's all about Jesus claiming to be one with the Father, he is claiming to be God.
Chris Johnson:Really, this whole book of John has been all about this. It's all about showing the deity of Jesus Christ. Recognizing that while Jesus was all men, he was God who put on flesh, Jesus still did not set aside his role in the Godhead. He still was also the son of God. And so he was fully man, but fully God.
Chris Johnson:And so John's whole focus throughout this book is on promoting and elevating and sharing Jesus as the son of God. And so in chapter 5 we really see the launch of the beginning of this happen. Now up until this time, as I said, Jesus had done a couple of miracles that kind of were on the private, a few people knew and word was probably starting to spread. And the, you know, the religious leaders as they looked at who Jesus was and what Jesus was doing, you know, they probably thought, hey, it's great for him to do miracles. It's great for him to help people.
Chris Johnson:But now Jesus is moving into some new territory and this is this is a pretty big deal. He starts off the chapter, chapter 5, by healing a man on the Sabbath. It was great that he healed him, but the fact that he did it on the Sabbath, that was a big no no. The religious leaders did not like that. And basically, Jesus's response to that was, hey, I can do whatever I want because on the I can do whatever I want on the Sabbath because I'm God.
Chris Johnson:He says he says that he is God and therefore he can heal whoever he wants, whatever he wants. He then begins to submit these outlandish claims that he is equal with God. Kind of in this middle part of the of chapter 5 here, he's gonna make these claims that, again, he's doing things that are outside the norm. He's he's doing something on the Sabbath. That just really irritated these leaders.
Chris Johnson:But now not only is he healing on the Sabbath, now he is making claims that he is on the same level with our heavenly father, on the same level with God the father. In this section, in the middle of the chapter, he he claimed to be equal in essence and in nature. He claimed to be equal in power. He said that he has the power to give life and also he has the power to raise life, power over death. He claimed to be equal to God in authority, that he was able to render final judgment on people.
Chris Johnson:He claimed to be equal in truth, that what he says and what God says are equally true. And then since all of this is true, he also claimed to deserve equal worship and honor as God. Well, man, you could just imagine how this made these religious leaders feel. They started immediately accusing him of blasphemy and and coming against him and and holding him in disdain because of this. So he's worked a miracle, claimed to be God over the Sabbath, he then makes claims of his equality with God.
Chris Johnson:And then if, you know, if he were making these claims in court, people would then say, okay, it's great that you're making all these claims, but what proof is there? What proof do you have that these claims are true? Are there any witnesses that would agree with your claims? And this is what happens next in the story, next in chapter number 5. So let's look at verses 30 through 47.
Chris Johnson:This is verses 30 down to the end of chapter number 5. And Jesus is going to verify his deity by sharing the witness testimony to the fact that he is exactly who he claims to be. So let's read these verses together, John chapter 5 verse 30 through 47. Jesus says I can do nothing on my own. As I hear, I judge, and my judgment is just because I seek not my own will, but the will of him who sent me.
Chris Johnson:If I alone bear witness about who sent me, if I alone bear witness about myself, my testimony is not true. There is another who bears witness about me, and I know that the testimony that he bears about me is true. You sent to John, and he was born witness to that truth. Now that the testimony that I received is from man, but I say these things so that you may be saved. He was a burning and shining light, and you were willing to rejoice for a while in his light.
Chris Johnson:But the testimony that I have is greater than that of John. For the works that the father has given me to accomplish, the very works that I am doing, bear witness about me that the father has sent me. And the father who sent me has himself born witness about me. His voice, you have never heard. His form, you've never seen.
Chris Johnson:And you do not have his word abiding in you, for you do not believe the one whom he has sent. You search the scriptures because you think that in them you have eternal life, and it is they that bear witness about me. Yet, you refuse to come to me that you may have life. I do not receive glory from people, but I know that you do not have the love of God within you. I have come in my father's name and you do not receive me.
Chris Johnson:If another comes in his own name, you will receive him. How can you believe when you receive glory from one another and do not seek the glory that comes from the only God? Do not think that I will accuse you to my father. There is one who accuses you, Moses, on whom you have set your hope. For if you believed Moses, you would believe me, for he wrote of me.
Chris Johnson:But if you do not believe his writings, how will you believe my words? So the ones who accused Jesus of blasphemy came to do so because of their reverence and their worship of God. So Jesus kind of decides to flip things here for them by sharing that his greatest witness to his deity is God himself. So God the father is the one that they claim to worship, surely they would believe his witness testimony. Surely they would believe the testimony of the one that they're claiming to defend and claiming to stand up for.
Chris Johnson:Jesus says, you want witness testimony? Well, I'll give you the testimony of the one true God. How can you deny that? Now at the beginning of this passage in verse number 30, Jesus basically sums up everything that he had been saying in the previous verses. He says here, I can do nothing on my own as I hear I judge and my judgment is just because I seek not my own will but the will of him who sent me.
Chris Johnson:Jesus says, I am one with God. Everything that I do is because it is the will of God. He does nothing on his own apart from God. God sent him and Jesus is completely surrendered to the will of God the Father. So Jesus is saying everything that I do is in line with the plan of God, with the mission of God, with the call of God, with the work of God.
Chris Johnson:He says here that it cannot be separated. And he even said goes far to say that he cannot do anything that is outside of the will of God. This again reminds us of the reality of Jesus' perfection and the fact that he never sinned. If Jesus had sinned and Jesus could have sinned, then he would not have been able to be our savior. But he says that there that he cannot do anything that is outside of the will of the father.
Chris Johnson:So therefore, again speaking to the reality that Jesus never had sinned and never would sin. In verse number 31, Jesus then recognizes that they need more witness than just him making these claims. Now when he says this, he says, if I alone bear witness about myself, my testimony is not true. He's not saying that his testimony isn't true and that he's he could be making this up and that he's lying and he's not telling the truth. That's not what Jesus is saying.
Chris Johnson:But what he is doing is, he's not saying that he isn't trustworthy, but he is deferring to them. He's deferring to them and what they claim to need in order to believe him. You see, hearken back to the book of Deuteronomy. Deuteronomy, the middle of the of the book of Deuteronomy there, we see that they were taught that if you wanted to receive a witness account, and that was that was to be verifying proof of something happening, then there needed to be 2 or 3 witnesses. So Jesus is saying, hey.
Chris Johnson:I recognize that you're not gonna believe just because I say it's true, but you need 2 or 3 witnesses. You need someone else to corroborate the things that I'm saying. And what greater witness is there other than God? What greater witness is there other than God the Father, the one that they claim to worship, the one that they claim to defend? So Jesus says, hey, you want a witness?
Chris Johnson:You want another witness? Well, I'm gonna give you the witness of our heavenly father. I'm gonna give you the witness of God himself. Now some commentators when they look at this and some people when they break this these next few verses down, they look at this as individual witnesses. And some even, you know, Titus would say witnesses of Jesus or 5 different witnesses or 6 witnesses and those kind of things.
Chris Johnson:And they'll say that it's the witness of of John the Baptist and the witness of the prophets and witness of the scriptures and we're gonna look at all of those things and those things are true. But I think if you look at this whole passage in context and really kind of look at these verses as one paragraph together, we'll see that really all of these different parts of the witness are all stemming from the ultimate witness of God the father. Every one of these witnesses that are mentioned in this could not have understood or known who Jesus was apart from God the Father, apart from God telling them and giving them. So ultimately, while we're looking at gonna be looking at 3 parts of the witness, the witness is ultimately coming from God himself because God is the one who bore witness to in these individuals and in these realities that then bore witness to the reality of Jesus being deity, Jesus being the Christ. So what is this 3 part witness that we're sharing?
Chris Johnson:First of all, we see that God gave witness through the witness of John the Baptist, the witness of John the Baptist. John, of course, the the author, the apostle John who wrote this book had already referenced John the Baptist at the very beginning of the book. If you remember in John chapter number 1, it says that John first was a witness to to Jesus' deity. It says that he received the truth, that he, that he knew the truth, and that that John himself even said, behold the lamb of God who takes away the sin of the world. He said, the Apostle John said of John the Baptist it gets kind of confusing with these 2 Johns together.
Chris Johnson:The Apostle John said of John the Baptist that he was the forerunner. He was the one who would come to bear witness of the true light. And so we we see from the beginning here that John the Baptist is here to bear witness of the deity of Christ. The reality is we can go all the way back to before John and Jesus were even born. We really have the the story, the telling in John chapter number 1 when, we find out that Elizabeth is pregnant with John.
Chris Johnson:Of course Zechariah couldn't speak and all the different things that came with that. And then a few months later the angel comes and tells Mary that she's going to be with child, that she is going to have a baby, that that baby is going to be Jesus. And then Mary goes to visit Elizabeth. And when Mary walks into the room where pregnant Elizabeth so you have pregnant Mary carrying Jesus, pregnant Elizabeth carrying John. The Bible tells us that the baby John leaped in his womb.
Chris Johnson:He leaped in his womb, in Elizabeth's womb, rejoicing at being in the presence of God, being in the presence of Jesus, being in the presence of deity. Now, of course, John can come up with that on his own. That came from the father. John received this truth to be this witness because it was given to him by the father. Now Jesus kind of plays a little bit and plays on kind of their the religious leaders themselves.
Chris Johnson:And he says, hey. You know, the reality is you religious leaders have been really excited about John coming on the scene. You know, there there had not been a prophet in some 400 years. And now for the first time, John has come as a prophet, and they were they were all called up in his teachings. They were all excited.
Chris Johnson:Have you heard about John? Have you heard about the teachings of John? Let's go let's go find John in the wilderness, so let's go hear John teach. And there were many that were being baptized by John and so they were all excited about hearing from John, but yet they weren't willing to receive the truth that John was proclaiming. I think they probably lost a little interest when John called them snakes and vipers.
Chris Johnson:That probably might have had something to do with it. But John didn't do miracles, but his primary role was to announce the coming of the Messiah. In in verse number 35, it says that Jesus says of John that he was a burning and shining lamp and you were willing to rejoice for a while in this light. Now he doesn't say that John was the light because we know again according to John 1, John was the one who was reflecting the light, the light is Jesus himself. John was a lamp who is reflecting and showing the light of Jesus.
Chris Johnson:Jesus is the light, John was the lamp. And so Jesus says of John that he was a burning and shining lamp. I think they liked the shining part, the part that was kind of new and the part that was interesting and the part that was intriguing of who John was, but they certainly didn't like the burning part of who John was. They didn't like the being pointed at and being their sin being called out and, and the light shining brightly and burning into them and burning on them and showing the sin that they were being a part of, showing, the legalism that they were living out. And man, we see the same in our world today, right?
Chris Johnson:We see people that love to celebrate the light of Jesus and love to celebrate the good things and the fun things and the things that are easy and the things that that make them feel better. But man, you start talking about Jesus calling out your sin and you start talking about your need for a savior and they start pulling back. They don't want to hear the burning light. They just want that shining light. And the same evidently was true here with John.
Chris Johnson:Jesus says, hey, you received him as a lamp at first. You were first willing to receive him, but then you were not willing to receive the message that he was proclaiming. Of course, we know that ultimately they would imprison John. We would see him imprisoned and ultimately beheaded. They received him as a prophet, but they rejected his message about Jesus being the lamb of God.
Chris Johnson:So the first part of God's witness to Jesus being deity is the witness of John the Baptist. The second part is the witness of Jesus' works, the witness of Jesus' works. Now Jesus says that this next part of the father's witness is even greater than the first part. You look at verse 36, but the testimony that I have is greater than that of John. For the works that the father has given me to accomplish the very works that I'm doing, bear witness about me that the Father has sent me.
Chris Johnson:Now verse 36 tells us that it is the fact that God enabled him to do the works that he was doing, that God enabled him to do the miracles that he had done and that he would be doing. It was the works of Jesus that were in sync and in line with the will of the father. You gotta remember that. Right? Jesus said everything I do is in line with the father and I cannot do anything that's outside of the the father's will.
Chris Johnson:So the very works that Jesus was doing were in sync with the will of the father and in complete sync with the will of the father. So the fact that Jesus was doing these works and doing these miracles in the power of God, he bore witness and gave testimony to the fact that he is one with the father. Everything that Jesus did was on behalf of the Father. The Father gave Jesus tasks to complete and Jesus was doing those things. So his works were God's works.
Chris Johnson:They saw the miracles, they saw the works of Jesus, and said over and over again, no one can do these things unless the father gives them the power to do it, but yet they still rejected Jesus as savior, Jesus as deity, Jesus as equal with God. So the 3 part focus of God's witness is using John the Baptist using the works of Jesus. And then 3rd, the witness of scripture, the witness of scripture. He now moves to really an even greater witness of the Father. This is the words of scripture.
Chris Johnson:He says in verse number 39, you search the scriptures and it is they that bear witness about me. He was again calling out to them and and really kind of holding them accountable because these leaders would have been the the most studied in the word of God, the most studied in the scriptures that they had up to this point. They would have known the old testament backwards and forwards. They studied it continuously, and they prided themselves on letting others know how well that they knew the scripture. And Jesus is saying, hey, you have searched the scriptures.
Chris Johnson:You can continue to search the scriptures. And as you study and search the scriptures, the scriptures bear witness to who I am. He said you've heard the words of Moses, the prophet, who is who is that first prophet, all the prophets who followed him in all the old testament. And everything in the Old Testament was pointing to the Messiah and it was pointing to the reality, it was bearing witness to the fact that Jesus who had come was that Messiah. These Jewish leaders knew the scripture inside and out, they studied them diligently, they had the head knowledge, but the Bible says that they still had hardened hearts.
Chris Johnson:If we look at just a few, we just recently celebrated Christmas and the beautiful gift of Jesus coming to be born. There were so many prophecies in the old testament that pointed to Jesus' coming. They tell of where he would born would gourd. They told of when his birth would be. They give the miraculous nature of his birth.
Chris Johnson:They list his ancestry. They allude to the assassination attempt on his life. They mention his sojourning to Egypt. They foretell the town of his upbringing. They describe his forerunner John who we've been talking about.
Chris Johnson:They predict what Jesus' ministry would look like. The scriptures tell about his eventual betrayal. The scriptures prophesy of his sufferings. They describe in details his death, his burial, his resurrection. And so all of scripture bears witness to the fact that Jesus is God.
Chris Johnson:So we see that the witness of John was that of a man and it certainly ended with John's death. The witness of Jesus' works was a greater witness as He did the miraculous, as He lived out these works, but in a visible physical sense that was while He was here on the earth. We now have the witness of scripture that is an even greater witness as the witness of scripture continues to bear testimony even to this day. It is a living book that points us to Jesus as the Messiah, as our savior. So what was the result of their hearing the witness testimony of God the father, hearing the testimony through John, through the works of Jesus and through scripture?
Chris Johnson:They still do not believe. Jesus told them, this is not because you don't have the evidence. The evidence is clear. The evidence is here. It's because you're choosing not to believe.
Chris Johnson:You're ultimately choosing to believe the lie. You're falling into this trap and you don't want to believe because and he ultimately says the reality is the reason you don't believe is because you don't know the father. You never met the father. You've never met this God that you claim to be defending. Verse 3738 say, you've never heard the voice of the Father, yet his word is not abiding in you.
Chris Johnson:Jesus told them that because they did not believe him or even the testimony of Moses and the prophets that he would not bear witness of them before the Father. He kind of mocks them by by saying, you know, it's crazy that that I come in the name of my father and they come I come in the name of God and you reject me, but yet you gladly follow those who come in their own name. Others that would just kind of stand up and make home claims, they would follow them, but yet they wouldn't follow Jesus despite the claims of scripture and the claims of of his words, the claims of John the Baptist ultimately being the claims of God himself. The truth is that they were blind and they couldn't see the truth. They were hearing the testimony.
Chris Johnson:They were seeing the miracles, reading the words of the prophets, yet they continued to reject it all. And again, don't we see that in the world today? We see a world today that has all the evidence laid out in front of them, but yet they continue to turn about turn away. They continue to turn their back on Jesus. They continue to deny the reality of Jesus being the Christ, being our savior.
Chris Johnson:So what are our practical takeaways from this today? First of all, number 1, although the evidence is clear, many will reject Jesus as the Christ, our savior. The evidence is clear, but many will reject Jesus as our savior. But here's the great thing. Even though it's rejected, even though people deny it, that does not change the truth.
Chris Johnson:That does not change the truth of who Jesus is. That does not change the truth of what God's word says about Jesus and we must hold fast to that truth. The next thing that we see is that the truth is spiritually discerned. The truth is spiritually discerned. We can preach it, we can proclaim it, we can create the atmosphere where it can be understood, but ultimately God is the one who gives witness.
Chris Johnson:God is the one who opens eyes. God is the one who saves people by his grace, by his mercy and by his goodness. That role is not ours. So the pressure is not on us to convince the lost. Yes, we want to share truth.
Chris Johnson:Yes, we want to be apologetic. We want to make arguments. We want to share the truth and we want to try our best to persuade people. Paul said, I tried to persuade, but not all can be persuaded. Ultimately it is God who does the saving.
Chris Johnson:So let's not put that pressure on ourselves. Our role is to present the evidence. Our role is to present the truth, but that truth must be spiritually discerned and the Holy Spirit must do the work to save souls. So number 3, we must faithfully proclaim the gospel witness and pray that the Holy Spirit will move on hearts. Yeah.
Chris Johnson:We must do all we can to share the gospel, to help get the vulnerable under the sound of the gospel. That's the whole heart of our ministry is we wanna make sure that the vulnerable children and women and families are under the sound of the gospel. That's where we pray and help them get into Christian homes and get into Bible preaching churches because we want them to hear the gospel. And so we as Christ followers, we must faithfully proclaim the truth of gospel witness. We must faithfully proclaim the truth of God's word and trust that God will open hearts, that he will move on hearts, and that he will save souls by his grace.
Chris Johnson:Let's go Lord in prayer and ask him to continue to guide us. Lord, we love you. We thank you for your goodness. We thank you for the truth of your word. We thank you that you are exactly who you claim to be.
Chris Johnson:Jesus, we thank you for being willing to put on flesh and to visit us in our affliction, to come alongside us and appoint us and to provide for our salvation, to allow us to be a part of the family of God, to be sons of God. Lord, we continue to pray for the ministry of Lifeline as we launch into this new year. We pray your blessings on our ministry. We pray that you will protect us, that you will keep us true to your word. We pray that you will give us greater opportunity to influence this world for the cause of Christ and to be able to help point vulnerable populations to the gospel, to help equip churches and Christian families to engage vulnerable populations with the gospel.
Chris Johnson:Lord, we prayed specifically this week for the country of India. So thankful for the ministry that's taking place there, Lord. I'm thankful for our team that that faithfully work hard to help orphan children in India find homes and come home to forever families. I'm thankful for, Lord, for our team there in India that does this work so faithfully. I'm thankful also for our global partners in India, God, that are caring for vulnerable children who maybe never will even have the opportunity to be adopted, but they continue to faithfully preach and proclaim the gospel.
Chris Johnson:Thank you for our team that supports them and comes alongside them. And, God, we pray that in this next year, Lord, that you will, that you will save souls there in India, that you will, bring people into your family, children into your family, vulnerable families, that they will find hope in the gospel of Jesus Christ. Raise up your people, God, and use your church in ways that are beyond our imagination, God. Continue to provide adoptive families who will welcome Indian children into their homes, point them to the hope of the gospel, disciple them, and raise them up so that they, can change until we can see their communities, their country, their world changed by the gospel of Jesus Christ. Lord, we love you.
Chris Johnson:We thank you for your goodness. We pray that you'll continue to work and guide us and lead us and direct us. For it's in Jesus' name we pray. Amen.
Herbie Newell:Thanks again for joining us for the defender bible study. If you enjoy making this podcast a part of your weekly routine, we'd love for you to take a moment to subscribe, rate, and review the defender bible study to make it easier for more people to find. For more resources and information on how you and your church can partner with Lifeline, please visit us at lifelinechild.org. Follow us on Facebook, Instagram, or Twitter by searching for Life line child. You can email us directly at info at lifeline child dot org.
Herbie Newell:We look forward to seeing you again next week for the defender bible study.