Sermon Tone Analysis

!! The Witnesses-Part II

!! John 5:32-47

 

Introduction:

            Jesus Christ is either who He said that He was or He is a liar, those are the only two choices that people have.

If there is ever a doubt in anyone’s mind as to the veracity of the claims of Christ’s deity, they should be laid to rest.

As I said last week to you, the words and the testimony of Christ are enough for the believer, but it will not be and has never been enough for the unbeliever.

And Christ realizes this and that it why He said what He said in verse 31.

He knew that His own words would not be enough for the unbelieving Jews, so brought in some witnesses, other than Himself, that gives evidence of the facts.

In a court of law, when a jury is faced with a case of either acquit or convict, there must be what is called “the preponderance of the evidence”, in other words there must be little to no doubt, based on facts, as to why I came to the conclusion.

That is what Christ is doing here with these Jews.

He gives them something better than “the preponderance of the evidence”; He gives them the immutable, omnipotent, sovereign testimony of His works, the Father, and the Scripture.

He goes beyond the well meaning testimony of John to the fact that the Father speaks to the facts of His deity, The works that He has performed speak to the fact of His deity, and the Holy Scriptures speak to the facts of His deity.

This is a fascinating passage and every believer, upon careful study of this text, should be able to defend the deity of Christ because there is undeniable evidence to the facts of His deity, notice:

 

I.

The Finished Works (vs.36)

Now secondly the testimony of the finished works, verse 36.

Christ says I'm going to bring another witness in here to show you that I'm God and this one's even greater than John.

Verse 36, "I have greater witness than that of John for the works which the Father hath given Me to finish, the same works that I do bear witness of Me that the Father hath sent Me."

You know what Christ said?

John's testimony is fine.

You know what's more effective than John's testimony, Christ says?

My own life and works.

The glorious life and works of Christ speak of His deity.

Nicodemus came to Jesus in John 3:2 and said, "We know that Thou art a man sent from God because nobody can do the things that Thou doest except...what?...God sent Him."

He was sent by God.

You can't do the things Jesus did and not come from God.  Nicodemus recognized that.

It's all over John's gospel.

Over in chapter 10, over in chapter 14, again and again and again he says His works declare who He is.

Start looking at the life of Christ, you can't help but see that He's God.

But not everybody does.

Isn't it amazing?

Not everybody does.

I meet people all the time with their little books announcing to the world that Christ is not God.

Blasphemy.

Listen, you see Him create wine and then tell me He's not God.

You see Him heal from a distance of 20 miles somebody that He's never seen with a visible eye and then tell me He's not God.

You see Him speak to a man 38 years impotent, tell that man rise up, take up your bed and walk, and the man does it and then tell me He's a man.

You hear Him call the dead to life as they come out of the graves and then tell me that's not deity.

You see Him touch deaf ears so that where there was never hearing there's crystal-clear sound and tell me that's not God.

You see Him touch blind eyes so that they see in complete focus, leper's skin so that it becomes pure and then tell me that's not God.

You watch Him take a handful of loaves and a couple of fishes and feed approximately 15,000 people and then tell me He's not God.

See His feet as they touch the troubled waters of the Galilee Sea and He walks undisturbed across its waves and then tell me He's not God.

On second thought, don't tell me, I won't believe it, the incomparable Christ, the Son of the living God is so obvious you have to be blind and that's exactly what men are not to see it.

Notice in verse 36 an important word, and there are so many key words in the Bible.

The word "given" in the middle of verse 36, it says, "The Father hath given Me to finish certain works."

Now does this mean that Christ didn't have the ability to do them until God gave Him the ability?

No, we talked about this last week, here's just a refresher.

When Christ was with God in heaven in eternity past He was equal, right?

In every way.

In Philippians 2, "He thought it not robbery or something to hold onto to be equal with God," totally equal.

"But He stripped Himself and gave it all up and became one of us."

When Christ came to earth He set aside all of His attributes, set them aside, all of them.

Then in effect He said this, "God, I'll only use the ones that You give Me to use."

He restricted Himself in humility to the operation of subordination to God.

That's what His humility was.

He said, "God, I'll only use the ones You want Me to use."

So here you have that right here.

The Father has given  back to Me some of My own powers to do some things that He wants Me to do.

It wasn't that He was not omnipotent, what did He say when He was standing right there in the garden and He said, "If I wanted to I could call 40 legions of angels," right?

Why didn't He?  Cause the Father hadn't given Him to do that.

He could have done anything but He didn't because He restricted Himself to that operation of the divine will of the Father.

And so God gave Him certain works to do.

You remember His works, we've just gone over them; the healing, the walking on water, the feeding the multitude, the touching of the lives of people, all the works of Christ.

You can't look at those and not conclude that He wasn't the Son of God.

And then over in John 17:4, I just love this, He was praying that glorious prayer.

He says, "I'm done, Father, I'm ready to come back."

He did the works God gave Him to do; the works of Jesus Christ are testimony to who He is.

Think of His resurrection, fantastic miracle.

It always amazes me when some pea brain character comes along and says, "Well He didn't rise, the disciples stole His body."

Sure.

When He died they scattered all over the place, eleven disorganized, crying, weeping, lost individuals tiptoeing through the whole Roman army, rolling away the stone and stealing the body.

And then after they stole the body eleven out of twelve of them went out and died as martyrs for a stolen body.

Sounds to me like a band of half wits to pull something like that.

Jesus Christ rose from the dead.

Everything in the world gives evidence of it.

Most of all the empty tomb.

See the works of Christ and tell me He's not God, I don't believe it.

II.

The Father’s Words (vs.

37-38)

Verse 32 connectes with 37, verse 32, "There's another that beareth witness of Me, besides Myself, and I know that the witness which He witness of Me is true."

Now verse 37, "And the Father Himself who has sent Me hath borne witness of Me."

In other words, He is saying here God Himself, His own word.

Now I'm not talking about Scripture here, but God's word bears witness.

You say, "Well what is God's word if it isn't Scripture?"

Oh, here's a fabulous truth.

I really got blessed on this one.

He says the Father word witnesses as to who I am.

You say, "What is this?"  Listen, this is conditional.

Look at verse 37 in the middle, He says to these Jews, "You have neither heard His voice at any time nor seen His shape and you have not His word abiding in you."

Ouch!

Oh, what a shot to the hearts of legalists who made their boasts in the knowledge of the Word.

He said you don't even have His Word in you.

Why?

"For whom He hath sent Him ye...what?...believe not."

What is this all about?

Listen to this, do you get the message of that statement?

He says to these Jewish leaders who had spent all their lives studying about God, "You don't know anything about God cause you don't know Me."  Whew, that's blasphemous egoism or it's true.

They prided themselves, they boasted themselves in the knowledge of God and here Jesus says you don't know anything about God.

Why?

Because you don't know Me, you don't believe in Me.