John 5:25-30
Sermon • Submitted
0 ratings
· 27 viewsNotes
Transcript
“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. 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 judgment. “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.
I like to give broad overviews of how to look at the entire scope of the Bible
Last week in talking about why we gather, it was said to experience the presence of God
And that was the entire flow of Scriptures from Genesis to Revelation
And like this, we can look at Scripture generally as God promising, and making good on his promises
From the very beginning in the garden, right after the Fall when he promised Satan in the hearing of Adam and Eve that Eve would produce an offspring that would crush Satan’s head
We see that God promises, and the entirety of creation history is him making good on his promises in a dazzling display
And that’s what makes Jesus the topic of discussion in true churches…because he is the very completion of all the promises in Scripture
For all the promises of God find their Yes in him. That is why it is through him that we utter our Amen to God for his glory.
For I tell you that Christ became a servant to the circumcised to show God’s truthfulness, in order to confirm the promises given to the patriarchs,
Let us hold fast the confession of our hope without wavering, for he who promised is faithful.
The whole Bible is filled with promises
And the end of those promises is that there will be rewards, and their will be punishment handed to all mankind
And those promises are all fulfilled in Jesus Christ
And we see here in John 5, Jesus himself speak explicitly about this
It has been awhile, so we must recap to know where we are right now in John 5
Jesus has just healed a man on the sabbath, and the Jews don’t like it
Jesus defends his actions by stating
But Jesus answered them, “My Father is working until now, and I am working.”
The greater work of salvation which is what the sabbath is all about
But this conversation we are at here is born from this issue the Jews had
This was why the Jews were seeking all the more to kill him, because not only was he breaking the Sabbath, but he was even calling God his own Father, making himself equal with God.
They did not like how this poor peasant from Galilee was being a little too haughty
So Jesus explains himself
He says first that he can do nothing outside the will of God---for the Father and Son have a shared will
And the Father has given the Son to do all the greatest works of creation for the creation to marvel
Judgement and Salvation—the end of all the promises of Scripture
Another words, if Jesus was just a typical man like all other men that existed on this earth
Then their heart burn of verse 18 would make sense
But Jesus is declaring himself to be the yes and the amen to all the promises of Scripture, from Genesis to Malachi (in his Day), and now from Genesis to Revelation (in our day)
Verses 25-26 he talks about his life given abilities as the Son of God (promise of salvation)
Verses 27-30 he talks about his authority to judge all the earth as the Son of Man (promise of judgement)
And these two titles are intentionally used because they are used in the Old Covenant—but in a very dark way—very mysterious
And now Jesus identifies as them and sheds full light showing the end of the titles in himself in the great work of salvation and judgement
Let’s take a look at Son of Man and Son of God
Son of God
Israel and the son of David are called the son of God
Then you shall say to Pharaoh, ‘Thus says the Lord, Israel is my firstborn son, and I say to you, “Let my son go that he may serve me.” If you refuse to let him go, behold, I will kill your firstborn son.’ ”
When Israel was a child, I loved him, and out of Egypt I called my son.
But then notice how Jesus fulfills Israel being God’s Son
Now when they had departed, behold, an angel of the Lord appeared to Joseph in a dream and said, “Rise, take the child and his mother, and flee to Egypt, and remain there until I tell you, for Herod is about to search for the child, to destroy him.” And he rose and took the child and his mother by night and departed to Egypt and remained there until the death of Herod. This was to fulfill what the Lord had spoken by the prophet, “Out of Egypt I called my son.”
Now we can also see David’s immediate son being called the son of God—but this too has ultimate fulfillment in Jesus, THE son of David—THE king of Israel
When your days are fulfilled and you lie down with your fathers, I will raise up your offspring after you, who shall come from your body, and I will establish his kingdom. He shall build a house for my name, and I will establish the throne of his kingdom forever. I will be to him a father, and he shall be to me a son. When he commits iniquity, I will discipline him with the rod of men, with the stripes of the sons of men,
Short term Solomon fulfilled this, but this has a long term promise too of Jesus, the son of David, assuming the throne of David forever as Son of God
Psalm 2 brings these themes together: kingdom, king, and Son and brings it all down on the coming Messiah
The kings of the earth set themselves, and the rulers take counsel together, against the Lord and against his Anointed, saying, “Let us burst their bonds apart and cast away their cords from us.” He who sits in the heavens laughs; the Lord holds them in derision. Then he will speak to them in his wrath, and terrify them in his fury, saying, “As for me, I have set my King on Zion, my holy hill.” I will tell of the decree: The Lord said to me, “You are my Son; today I have begotten you.
Son of God had a regal, kingship tone to it
And as we will see now, so did the title Son of Man
After describing the kingdoms of the world, Daniel sees the kingdom of Christ
“I saw in the night visions, and behold, with the clouds of heaven there came one like a son of man, and he came to the Ancient of Days and was presented before him. And to him was given dominion and glory and a kingdom, that all peoples, nations, and languages should serve him; his dominion is an everlasting dominion, which shall not pass away, and his kingdom one that shall not be destroyed.
Jesus Christ came preaching the kingdom at hand…and he referred to himself mostly as the Son of Man
Notice how these two titles, Son of God, Son of Man have a lot in common
Power, authority, dominance
Intimacy with God
Humanity, but yet something profoundly more
Both titles are very similar
And here in John 5:25-30 we see Jesus use these titles purposefully to show that he is the end of it—the fulfillment of it
That by the powers associated with it, he is the yes and the amen to all the promises of Scripture…to Scripture itself
And by the very nature of who he is, he cannot break the sabbath, and it is only rightful that he would speak about God in such an intimate way
For he is the promised Son of God, and Son of Man
And so 5:25-26 Jesus speaks about him being the Son of God
Thus he has the power of himself to provide salvation
Israel was to bring salvation to the nations
Spear headed by the King of Israel in which God called his son
Jesus fulfills this
“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.
Notice a few things about this:
1—This act has been highly anticipated and is here now an hour is coming, and is now here (promised and finally happening)
2—It is exclusive only those who hear will live
3—How the dead hear the dead will hear, since the Son has been granted to have life of himself
Only God has life in and of himself…and so Jesus is declaring the title of Son of God to be much more than human
What is to happen now that Jesus, the son of God, the fulfillment of all the promises have come?
The dead will hear
Where Adam and his posterity died in the garden, we can be made alive in the Son of God
As we talked about last week, the dead are those who have sin corruption in their heart and are dead to the things of God
God did not change in the garden, man did, and man became dead to God when they fell into sin
as it is written: “None is righteous, no, not one; no one understands; no one seeks for God. All have turned aside; together they have become worthless; no one does good, not even one.”
But Jesus says the day is here when some of these dead people will hear the Son of God
Now—I don’t know how much experience you have had with dead people, but for them to hear it means that a miracle has just taken place
And so how this impossibility is explain by Jesus ( a dead person hearing)
is that they hear the voice of the Son of God who has life in himself granted by the Father
Thus the voice proceeds from the One who is life, and in the voice comes the power of resurrection life
And so as the Son of God—he has been granted to have life of himself that only God has
And with this life he can cause the dead to come alive
Notice how this further explains the son of God title of David’s sons
Not only does it explain authority to rule Israel but it looks ahead to THE Son of God who has divinity…who is the only hope for the promises of salvation to a dead Adamic race
Jesus Christ, the Son of God, truly is the yes and the amen of the promise of Salvation, for without his power to give life, we would all still be dead in our sins and trespasses
Notice he says such life giving power is received in hearing his voice
How many of us are saved? That means you were once dead but you are claiming you have been brought to life
How many of us heard Jesus’ voice when we drew our first fresh breath of spiritual air?
So is Jesus lying here? No
His voice is heard in the preaching, the proclamation of the gospel
That is the means he has chosen to make his voice heard
How many of you heard the gospel when you came to life? All of us
The voice he speaks of here is the gospel message
Who are the ones proclaiming the gospel? The ones he has already made alive: the church
Thus you and I, the church, are used as means to be the voice of the Son of God—the power to bring the dead back to life
Why has the church grown so cold to such power? Where has our evangelistic fervor gone? Our overwhelming desire to talk about the true gospel to anyone we can?
Our confidence that this message is able to do the most amazing miracle—make a dead man live
The church has fallen pry to arminianism which more or less says humans are simply deaf in their sins
Now when you have someone who is deaf, you will find creative ways to get your message across to them
The church in many ways has brought it upon themselves to get creative with the message, and thus the power is lost to awaken the dead
The truth is, we are not talking to deaf people, we are talking to dead people
And when someone tries to pass along a message to someone who is dead, you do not rest on creative ways, but instead beg God for a miracle to cause this person to come to life to receive the much needed message
And when you realize that the Son of God is able to do it, and he chooses his gospel as his voice
You don’t mess around with it, but declare and proclaim his voice as true and faithful to it as possible
But we have renounced disgraceful, underhanded ways. We refuse to practice cunning or to tamper with God’s word, but by the open statement of the truth we would commend ourselves to everyone’s conscience in the sight of God.
Our desire is to get the Son of God’s voice right
And we only get it right when we get the gospel right
Our desire is to worship the Son of God
And we worship the Son of God by joyfully praising him for what he has done
i.e. the gospel
This is why our focus is the gospel
It awakens the dead, and it awakens our ever wandering hearts back to Christ
Do you want to see a loved one saved?
You prove that by how much you pray to God that the Son of God would awaken them
And you also prove it by how much you pray to God that he would use you as the means to be the voice of the gospel to them
But do not expect to used like this if you scarcely preach the gospel to yourself
Jesus defends himself as being equal with the Father and Lord over the sabbath
By stating his power to speak life into the dead
Even when there is an ocean of dead men walking
He can speak life in a few and cause them to walk in newness of life
This is the Son of God fulfilling the promises of salvation in Scripture
Now the Son of Man as judge to all
And he has given him authority to execute judgment, because he is the Son of Man. 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 judgment.
Notice a few things
1—How inclusive the language is all who are in the tombs will hear his voice and come out
And just as it is appointed for man to die once, and after that comes judgment,
No one can deny the authority of the Son of Man to judge, all will appear before him…such rebellion will exist no longer at the judgement seat of Christ
The Son of Man’s kingdom—in Daniel—is general—over all mankind thus all will appear before him
“I saw in the night visions, and behold, with the clouds of heaven there came one like a son of man, and he came to the Ancient of Days and was presented before him. And to him was given dominion and glory and a kingdom, that all peoples, nations, and languages should serve him; his dominion is an everlasting dominion, which shall not pass away, and his kingdom one that shall not be destroyed.
Christ’s kingdom is an everlasting dominion, it will not pass away, and will not be destroyed
This is only possible if the Son of Man has authority to judge and punish all enemies of his kingdom
all who are in the tombs will hear his voice and come out
2—How judgement is executed: the Son of Man—the one who has the kingdom
His kingdom is not just over a small plot of land in Palestine....all will come before him…his kingdom is over all the earth and heavens
Notice how he says do not marvel
They would not have marvelled at the lofty things the Son of Man and Son of God could do
They would marvel at this lowly peasant claiming himself to have such far reaching power and authority
But Jesus unapologetically declares himself to have the authority and power of the Son of God and Son of Man
How can we, as his church, come together and do anything else but give such a figure all worship honor and praise???
3—I want you to notice how we are intimately involved in this
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 judgment.
We all will be judged by our works—good, evil
We cannot get it twisted that since it is up to Christ to bring alive the dead that our choices do not matter
Our choices will lead us to eternal life or death
People who lack understanding will use this as a way to say if we just do enough good, we will make it into heaven
But define good
Good is not man’s definition but God’s definition
And Good to God is when we do things in accordance with the life Jesus has given us
as it is written: “None is righteous, no, not one; no one understands; no one seeks for God. All have turned aside; together they have become worthless; no one does good, not even one.”
We do good when we earnestly seek God in all our ways
And the only appropriate way to seek God, Scripture makes clear
For it to be through the yes and amen of all promises of Scripture
Jesus Christ
A life of good works outside of Christ is detestable to God
Those who do good are those who seek after Christ who is the end of all the promises of God
In conclusion
There is a very real tendency that is natural in our flesh to be humanistic in our approach to Christianity
We seek to find self in Scriptures, and we see self primarily in what makes our life significant
One SBC darling has said she tries her best to find herself in every page of Scripture
God has a much better way that is Christocentric instead
He is a God of promises
And he is faithful and true to those promises
And we see this most clearly in His Son Jesus Christ
He is the yes and the amen to all promises
Salvation and Judgement
And it is not as if self does not matter
We are to consider self and be concerned with self
Being centered, however, on the centrality of Christ and the promises of God in his word
And so it is good to ask, has the Son of God called me to salvation and life in his gospel?
Have I responded in doing good—a desire to glorify Him in His Kingdom?
Or is all I have waiting for me is for the Son of Man to judge me as a rebel in which I will be thrown out of his glorious kingdom
All mankind will receive one promise or the other;
Let us:
“Strive to enter through the narrow door. For many, I tell you, will seek to enter and will not be able.
