John 1
and Historical Introduction
We will be spending most of our time in the
first chapter of the Gospel of John.
However, I would like to take our time
getting there.
You see, this Gospel is very unique, both in
its content and in its place in history.
And by that I mean, this Gospel, and the
rest of John's inspired books, were written some years after the rest of the
New Testament Scriptures had been completed.
Is that significant?
Well, I believe it could be.
So, what I would like to do is spend a few
minutes looking at the world through the eyes of the Apostle John, and through
the eyes of his contemporaries.
Certainly, we will use of the Word of God
as our central authority, only filling in a few gaps with the less reliable resource
of secular history.
And I hope this little exercise will give
us a renewed appreciation for this very special Gospel which is before us.
So let's begin.
~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~
It was the year 87 A.D. (give or take a few
years).
The Apostle John, an old man by now, and
probably living in
Ephesus
,
was looking back over a long and eventful life.
It seemed like yesterday, but in fact it had
been about 50 years, since that evening when Jesus appeared in their midst.
His "Peace be unto you" had turned their fear into joy.
Oh, those had been wonderful days, although
sometimes a little confusing.
For instance, there was that morning--after
a fruitless night of fishing--when Jesus cooked their breakfast.
That was the morning He got Peter back on
track.
And he would never forget the day of
Pentecost when the prophecy of Joel had been fulfilled.
Empowered by the Holy Spirit, Peter had preached
boldly to the assembled crowd, and 3000 Jews had been added to their number.
And then there was that morning when he and
Peter had gone to the temple at the hour of prayer.
A lame man had been healed, and once again
Peter laid it on the line: "The God of Abraham, and of Isaac, and of Jacob, the God of our
fathers, hath glorified his Son Jesus; whom ye delivered up, and denied him in
the presence of Pilate, when he was determined to let him go.
14: But ye denied the Holy One and the Just, and desired a murderer to
be granted unto you;
15: And killed the Prince of life, whom God hath raised from the dead;
whereof we are witnesses."
Well,
they ended up getting arrested, but another 5000 of their countrymen had been
added to the fold.
But
the more they grew, the more the Jews hated them.
One
of the casualties of their animosity was his own brother James, and had it not
been for God's divine intervention, Peter would have been next.
~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~
At
the beginning, God had backed them up with signs and wonders, but as time went
on, the Holy Spirit began to lay a more sure foundation.
Surprisingly,
Matthew, who had been a tax collector and despised by the Jews, was chosen to
write to these very same people, identifying the Lord Jesus as their Messiah.
And
then Mark had been chosen to write another Gospel that would click with the
Roman mind.
In
it, Jesus was portrayed as the suffering Servant of Jehovah.
And
Luke, the beloved physician, had written the longest gospel of all.
It
revealed Christ’s perfect humanity, and was slanted toward the Greek mind-set.
And
then there were the other inspired works, laying the doctrinal foundation of
the Church through its apostles and prophets.
Added
to these were the writings of Paul, that unlikely but chosen vessel whom the
Holy Spirit used to record a great volume of scripture.
And
then the New Testament scriptures appeared to be finished.
There
had been no new revelations for about 20 years.
~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~
I'm
sure some people wondered why John hadn't been chosen to labour in this important
work.
After
all, he had enjoyed a very special relationship with his Lord.
Along
with his brother, James, and the Apostle Peter, John had been selected to
witness the Lord’s transfiguration.
And
Jesus had chosen these same three men to be close to Him during that awful time
of agony in the Garden.
And
you might say John was even closer to
his Lord than the other two.
There
was that night in the upper room when the disciples shared their last Passover
with Jesus.
John
was right beside Him.
In
fact, he was resting his tired head on Jesus’ chest.
And
if his eyes were beginning to droop, I'm sure they came wide open when Jesus
said, "Verily, verily, I say unto
you, that one of you shall betray me."
Apparently,
Jesus had felt it necessary to warn them, but He wasn't about to reveal the
identity of the traitor.
After
all, the disciples might have become violent, and who knows what Peter might've
done.
But
John was different.
When he whispered in Jesus’ ear, "Lord,
who is it?"-- Jesus quietly responded, "He it is, to whom I shall give a sop, when I have dipped
it."
Yes,
John had always been very close to Jesus, but for some reason, he hadn't been
chosen to be one of the inspired writers.
And
by this time, all of the other disciples, and even the Apostle Paul, had gone
on to glory, and there had been no new revelation for many years.
However,
John had made an important contribution in other ways.
Hadn't
Jesus entrusted him with the care of His own dear mother?
After
Joseph had passed off the scene, and being the eldest son, it would have been
Jesus’ responsibility to take care of His mother.
When
this was no longer possible, He had committed her care into the hands of His
dear friend, John.
I
think that says a lot for their relationship, and
perhaps a lot about the prevailing situation in Jesus’ home.
And
certainly, John had lived a full life in His service.
He
had been a pillar in the church at
Jerusalem
,
although that was no longer the case.
You
see, the church at
Jerusalem
no longer existed, because
Jerusalem
itself no longer existed.
Or,
at least, it only existed as a heap of scorched stones.
About
20 years ago, the Jews had rebelled against the Romans.
The
fighting had been fierce, but, in the end, the Jews had been defeated, and
Jerusalem
had been
levelled to the ground.
Forty
years before that awful event, Jesus had seen it all, and had grieved over the
fate of its inhabitants:
Luke
19:41-44 "And when he was come
near, he beheld the city, and wept over it,
42: Saying, If thou hadst known, even thou, at
least in this thy day, the things which belong unto thy peace! but now they are hid from thine eyes.
43: For the days shall come upon thee, that thine enemies shall cast a trench about thee, and compass thee round, and keep thee
in on every side,
44: And shall lay thee even with the ground, and thy children within
thee; and they shall not leave in thee one stone upon another; because thou knewest not the time of thy visitation."
It
has been estimated by some that 600,000 people died within the city walls, but
Josephus puts the figure at 1,100,000.
And
he also says an additional 97,000 were distributed throughout the
Roman Empire
as slaves.
Some
of these wretched individuals would row in Roman galleys, while still others
would face wild animals in Roman coliseums.
Their
ancestors had rejected the Promised Land, and had wandered for 40 years in the
wilderness.
They
had rejected both their King and their kingdom-- and would wander a much longer
time in their ‘wilderness’ before they would enter their ‘Promised Land.’
And
what was true of their capital city was equally true of their great temple.
It
had taken 46 years to complete the main structure, and another 36 years to
finish the temple complex.
Four
years after its completion, and according to Jesus’ words, there was not left
"one stone upon another."
~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~
But
as
Israel
declined, the
Church
of
Jesus Christ
increased.
In
spite of persecution, it now extended to the far-flung corners of the known
world.
However,
what the enemy could not accomplish without, it was accomplishing within.
False
doctrines had taken root, and not surprisingly, Jesus’ perfect manhood and His divinity
were coming under attack.
It
was time for a fourth Gospel to be written.
And
it was time for that beloved disciple to be pressed into service.
And
so, under the inspiration of the Holy Spirit, John dipped his pen and began to
write.
~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~
The
first three words to appear on the page were, "In the beginning.”
Those
were the very same words the Holy Spirit had used to begin the book of
Genesis.
Yes,
once again He was bringing us back to the very beginning, and for a very
specific reason.
In
Genesis 1:1 He had written---"In
the beginning God created the heaven and the earth."
So
much is packed into this one short verse!
First
of all, the word that the Holy Spirit used for God is Elohim,
which is a plural noun.
And
yet the very next word "created" is a singular verb, attesting to the fact that God is One, and yet more than
One.
This
is further emphasized in V 3, where we read, "And God said, Let us (plural) make man in our image, after our likeness (again plural): and let them have dominion over the fish
of the sea," etc.
And
Genesis 1:1 also nails down the fact that God is the Creator---"In the beginning God created the
heaven and the earth."
There
it is, plain and simple, and without any long theological argument to back it
up.
It
doesn't need any.
The
"heaven and the earth" are
all the proof we need.
Yes,
"The heavens declare the glory of
God; and the firmament sheweth his handywork.
2: Day unto day uttereth speech, and night
unto night sheweth knowledge.
3: There is no speech nor language, where their voice is not
heard."
~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~
And
that's exactly how the Holy Spirit introduced the Gospel of John.
John
1:1-2 "In the beginning was the Word, and the Word
was with God, and the Word was God.
2: The same was in the beginning with God."
There
are at least two things that we can learn from these verses---"the Word was God" and "the Word was with God."
That's
God with God, isn't it?
So
once again, the Holy Spirit has wasted no time in identifying the plurality of
God.
At
this point He hasn't made the connection between "the Word" and Jesus, but in V 14 He will definitely do
that.
In
the meantime, I would like to assume this relationship, and ask the question, Why would "the
Word" be an appropriate name for Jesus?
I
think the best way to answer this question is, first of all, to consider the
whole subject of words.
Jesus
once said---"out of the abundance
of the heart the mouth speaketh."
And
that's true, isn't it?
A
man is a mystery until he begins to talk.
But
when he opens his mouth, he reveals both his thoughts, and sometimes even his
character.
And
that's why "the Word" is
such an appropriate name for Jesus.
He
reveals the very thoughts and character of His Heavenly Father.
In
fact, He could say to Philip---"he
that hath seen me hath seen the Father."
15
And
so, still assuming the fact that Jesus is the one being referred to, the very
next verse identifies Him as the Creator.
V 3 "All things were made by him; and without him was not any thing made
that was made."
I
like the way the Holy Spirit nails it down.
First
of all, He says "All things were made by him.”
And
just in case we didn't get it, or didn't want to get it, He also says---"and without him was not any thing made that was made."
~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~
V 4-5 "In him was life; and the life was the light
of men.
5: And the light shineth in darkness; and the
darkness comprehended it not."
"In him was life"---We could
certainly say Jesus was the source of physical life, but that's not what this
verse is talking about.
It's
talking about eternal life, which is a whole different matter.
Jesus
didn't become the source of eternal life by being the Creator.
As "the Lamb of God, which taketh away the sin of the world," He obtained it.
And
even though our Heavenly Father could simply speak the word, and bring
everything into existence, eternal life was obtained at infinite cost.
And
I think that relative value is reflected in His Word.
For instance, the Holy Spirit only uses five
words---"he made the
stars also"---to describe God's marvellous universe, but He devotes 50 chapters to describe
the tabernacle.
~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~
And so Jesus is both the Life and the Light
of the world, but He was also
Israel
's
promised Messiah.
And as such, His herald, John the Baptist,
must go before Him.
John 1:6-7 "There was a man sent from God, whose name was John.
7: The same came for a witness, to bear witness of the Light, that all men through him might believe."
700 years before Christ’s coming, John the Baptist’s ministry had been foretold in Isaiah 40:3.
He was to be "The voice of him that crieth in the
wilderness, Prepare ye the way of the LORD, make straight in the desert a
highway for our God."
And did you notice who this highway was for?
Not for a prophet or a king, although Jesus
was both.
It was a "highway for our God."
~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~
John 1:8-10 "He was not that Light, but was sent to bear witness of that Light.
9: That was the true Light, which lighteth every man that cometh into the world.
10: He was in the world, and the world was made by him, and the world
knew him not.
11: He came unto his own, and his own received him not."
Yes, the unthinkable happened.
His own creation, and even His own nation, "knew him not."
Nevertheless, both in
Israel
and in
the Gentile world, there would be a remnant that would believe, and would
become members of God’s family.
V 12-13 "But as many as received
him, to them gave he power to become the sons of God, even to them that believe
on his name:
13: Which were born, not of blood, nor of the will of the flesh, nor of
the will of man, but of God."
Yes, the "Son of God" had come to make "sons of God."
~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~
V 14 "And the Word was made flesh, and dwelt
among us, (and we beheld his glory, the glory as of the only begotten of the
Father,) full of grace and truth."
So there you have it---"the Word was made flesh, and dwelt among
us."
We don't have to assume the connection
between "the Word" and Jesus any longer.
Jesus is the only one who is both God and
man.
~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~
And before we press on with the next verse
in John, this might be a good time to pause for a moment and consider the
difference between this Gospel and the other three.
Because the Gospel of John is focussing on the deity of Jesus, its contents are much
different.
For example, there isn't any genealogy.
And that would make sense, wouldn't
it?
God doesn't have a genealogy.
And there isn't any manger scene with its adoring
shepherds.
Also, there are no wise men visiting the
young Child.
And there is no record of this young Child's
boyhood.
All this is covered by a simple statement
in V 14--- "And the Word was made
flesh, and dwelt among us."
And this Gospel doesn't cover many other
things that the other three do.
However, Jesus’ I AM sayings, emphasizing the
name of deity that was revealed to Moses out of the burning bush, are all here,
and nowhere else.
~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~
Getting back to John 1:15,
we find John the Baptist preparing the nation for their anticipated Messiah.
V 15 "John bare witness of him, and cried, saying, This was he of whom I spake, He that cometh after me is preferred before me: for
he was before me."
I'd
like to take a moment to focus on John's tremendous step of faith.
God
had told him to rouse the nation, while as yet John had no idea who the Messiah
was, or where He was.
As
he freely admits in V 31, "---I knew him not: but that he should be made manifest to
Israel
,
therefore am I come baptizing with water."
And that's often the way God does things.
Like the priests of old, we must dip our
feet in the
Jordan
before He will roll back the waters.
If we're not willing to get our feet wet,
we could stand on the shore for years.
But John was willing, and in due time, God let
him know who he was talking about.
While he was baptizing in
Jordan
, the
Holy Spirit descended upon his very own cousin.
Apparently, John already recognized Jesus
as a great prophet, for he said,"I have need to be
baptized of thee, and comest thou to me?"
But it wasn't until Jesus came up out of
the water and the Holy Spirit descended upon Him that John actually knew his
cousin was the Messiah.
What a surprise that must have been!
But I'll tell you something even more
surprising.
Isn't it kind of unusual that Jesus needed
to be identified at all?
After all, He is the Messiah, and even the Son
of God.
Nevertheless, He had to be identified.
No, He wasn't wearing a halo.
And He wasn't head and shoulders above the
crowd like Saul.
And He wasn't like Absalom who was praised
in all
Israel
for his beauty.
And, as Isaiah 53:2 puts it "---he hath no form nor comeliness; and when we shall see him, there is no beauty that we should desire
him."
He was just like the tabernacle in the
wilderness that portrays Him so well.
All the gold and brilliant colours were on the inside for God’s appreciation, while the outside was covered with badgers’ skins.
Certainly, He was God, but He was God
veiled in human flesh.
And so John needed a sign to identify Him,
and later on, when Jesus returned from His 40-day fast in the wilderness, John had
to point Him out to the rest of the nation.
And that's where we pick up our story in John
1:15-19---"John bare witness of him, and cried, saying, This was he of whom I spake, He
that cometh after me is preferred before me: for he was before me.
16: And of his fulness have all we received,
and grace for grace.
17: For the law was given by Moses, but grace and truth came by Jesus
Christ.
18: No man hath seen God at any time; the only begotten Son, which is in
the bosom of the Father, he hath declared him.
19: And this is the record of John, when the Jews sent priests and
Levites from
Jerusalem
to ask him, Who art thou?"
Did
you notice in V 17, John told everyone that Jesus was the Christ, or the
Messiah?
So
now everyone knows who He is, right?
Not
really.
Yes,
they knew His name, but who was Jesus?
Don't
forget, He had come from
Nazareth
, way up north
in Galilee, but at this point in time, He was down south in Judea near
Jerusalem
, where He was a
perfect stranger.
And
so, even though John had dropped a name, the people still didn't know who their
Messiah was.
V 19-25 "And this is the record of John, when the
Jews sent priests and Levites from
Jerusalem
to ask him, Who art thou?
20: And he confessed, and denied not; but confessed, I am not the
Christ.
21: And they asked him, What then? Art thou
Elias? And he saith, I am not.
Art thou that prophet? And he answered, No.
22: Then said they unto him, Who art thou? that we may give an answer to them that sent us. What sayest thou of thyself?
23: He said, I am the voice of one crying in the wilderness, Make
straight the way of the Lord, as said the prophet Esaias.
24: And they which were sent were of the Pharisees.
25: And they asked him, and said unto him, Why baptizest thou then, if thou be not that Christ, nor Elias, neither that prophet?"
I
think it's obvious that the priests and Levites had been sent to check out
John's credentials.
And,
anticipating what might have been their first question, John said, "I am not the Christ."
Or
in other words, I'm not your Messiah.
And then they asked him if he was "Elias.”
Actually, that was quite a reasonable
question.
The last two verses of the Old Testament
promised Elijah's return.
Malachi 4:5-6 "Behold, I will send you Elijah the prophet before the coming of the
great and dreadful day of the LORD:
6: And he shall turn the heart of the fathers to the children, and the
heart of the children to their fathers, lest I come and smite the earth with a
curse."
Well, John answered no.
Then they asked him if he was "that prophet."
Again, their question was based on
scripture.
In Deuteronomy18:15 we read, "The LORD thy God will raise up unto
thee a Prophet from the midst of thee, of thy brethren, like unto me; unto him
ye shall hearken.”
That could only refer to Jesus, who was of His brethren but was also like unto God, because He was God.
Of course, John answered no.
By this time, they had exhausted all their
options, and were literally demanding an answer.
So John gave them one.
Referring to Isaiah 40:3, he said, "I am the voice of one crying in the wilderness, Make straight the
way of the Lord, as said the prophet Esaias."
That
didn't seem to satisfy them, and, in fact, that might have been part of the
problem.
Because
this man was drawing all the people into the wilderness, the temple coffers
might have been getting empty.
Whatever the case, he just didn't fit into
their criteria.
If he wasn't Christ, or Elijah, or that
prophet, then he shouldn't be baptizing!
So, faced with their narrow views on the subject,
John simply pointed them to Jesus.
V 26-28 "---I baptize with water: but there standeth one
among you, whom ye know not;
27: He it is, who coming after me is preferred before me, whose shoe's
latchet I am not worthy to unloose.
28: These things were done in Bethabara beyond
Jordan
,
where John was baptizing."
Did you notice John's comment, "there standeth one among you, whom ye know not"?
Perhaps after returning from His 40-day
fast, Jesus was standing in the crowd, listening to this conversation.
Certainly He was there on the very next day
when John made his long-awaited announcement.
V 29 "The next day John seeth Jesus coming unto
him, and saith, Behold the Lamb of God, which taketh away the sin of the world."
I can almost see him stretching out his
hand towards Jesus, and pointing Him out as "the Lamb of God."
Certainly
Israel
knew all about the Passover
lamb that had shielded their ancestors from God’s wrath.
And they knew all about the sacrifices God
had instituted to cover their sin.
But this was different.
John was talking about a Lamb who could
take away sin.
~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~
To use a modern example, you might say the
Old Testament economy handled sin in much the same way that we handle our
nuclear waste.
We know it's dangerous, but we don't know
how to get rid of it.
So we bury it, and hope no one will dig it
up.
Now that's irresponsible, isn't it!
To keep on manufacturing a problem you
can't handle is irresponsible.
But unlike man, God never acts in an
irresponsible manner.
Granted, He did cover sin in the Old Testament, but He knew exactly what He was going to do with it.
And that's what John was talking about.
God had provided a "Lamb" Who would take away sin; and not just
Israel
's sin,
but the sin of the whole world.
And then John makes the connection between
this "Lamb" and the
Messiah they had all been waiting for.
V 30-34 "This is he of whom I said, After me cometh a man
which is preferred before me: for he was before me.
31: And I knew him not: but that he should be made manifest to
Israel
,
therefore am I come baptizing with water.
32: And John bare record, saying, I saw the Spirit descending from
heaven like a dove, and it abode upon him.
33: 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 is he which baptizeth with the Holy Ghost.
34: And I saw, and bare record that this is the Son of God."
Yes, John could positively identify Jesus
as the Messiah.
God had given him a sign.
And not only was Jesus their Messiah, but
He was "the Lamb of God," and as we see in V 34, He was "the
Son of God."
Yes, that was Jesus’ true identity, but
Israel
would
never accept it.
They wouldn't even accept the fact that He
was their Messiah -- not then, or throughout His amazing 3- 1/2 years of public
ministry.
So, after all these weeks of preparation,
we don't read of any rejoicing in John's announcement.
~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~
As for Jesus, it signalled the beginning of His public ministry.
On the very next day, He began to gather up
His disciples, and you might say John the Baptist got the ball rolling.
V 35-37 "Again the next day after John stood, and two of his
disciples;
36: And looking upon Jesus as he walked, he saith,
Behold the Lamb of God!
37: And the two disciples heard him speak, and they followed Jesus."
And John was happy to let them go---"He must increase, but I must
decrease."
~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~
It is obvious from the context that Andrew
was one of these men, and we're almost certain that the Apostle John was the
other.
V 38-39 "Then Jesus turned, and saw them following,
and saith unto them, What seek ye? They said unto
him, Rabbi, (which is to say, being interpreted, Master,) where dwellest thou?
39: He saith unto them, Come and see. They
came and saw where he dwelt, and abode with him that day: for it was about the
tenth hour."
At first they just followed Jesus, but it
wasn't long before He turned and said, "What seek ye?"
Well, they were seeking Him.
They weren't looking for a casual word by
the way.
They wanted to make an appointment with
this teacher.
No, unlike some of us with our busy
schedules, they weren't too busy to sit at Jesus’ feet, and they stayed all
day.
V 40-41 "One of the two which heard John speak, and followed him, was Andrew,
Simon Peter's brother.
41: He first findeth his own brother Simon,
and saith unto him, We have
found the Messias, which is, being interpreted, the
Christ."
As John has just pointed out, the Hebrew
word Messiah is the same as the Greek
word Christ.
And did you notice the first thing Andrew
said to his brother---"We have
found the Messias"?
This lowly fisherman didn't seem to have
any problem identifying Christ, while his religious leaders would never get it
right.
V 42 "And he brought him to Jesus. And when Jesus beheld him, he said, Thou
art Simon the son of Jona:---"
Jesus didn't need an introduction, did He?
He already knew his name, and even his
father's name.
And the first thing He did was change it---"thou shalt be
called Cephas, which is by interpretation, A stone."
Those who study such things tell us the
name Simon means obedient, and Jona means a dove.
So here you have obedient, the son of a
dove.
No wonder Jesus changed it!
The name stone fit him much better, and he would be a stone that would need
a lot of polishing.
V 43-44 "The day following Jesus would go forth into
Galilee
,
and findeth Philip, and saith unto him, Follow me.
44: Now Philip was of
Bethsaida
,
the city of Andrew and Peter."
Bethsaida
means the house of nets, and that's exactly what it was.
Yes, it was a fishing village, and one whose inhabitants had very little spiritual insight.
That was brought out later when they ended
up on Jesus’ list of unresponsive citizens.
Matthew 11:21 "Woe unto thee, Chorazin! woe unto thee,
Bethsaida
! for if the mighty works, which were done in you, had
been done in
Tyre
and
Sidon
, they would have
repented long ago in sackcloth and ashes."
Nevertheless, Jesus wanted these three
inhabitants of
Bethsaida
to be His disciples, and He had even gone looking for Philip.
No, it doesn't matter where you have come
from, only who you have come to.
~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~
John 1:45 "Philip findeth Nathanael, and saith unto him, We have found him,
of whom Moses in the law, and the prophets, did write, Jesus of
Nazareth
, the son of
Joseph."
I'm sure both of these men were well
acquainted with the scriptures, but they were ignorant of the actual facts.
As a result, the moment Philip mentioned "Jesus of Nazareth," Nathanael
stopped him cold.
"Can
there any good thing come out of
Nazareth
?"
And, of course, he was right.
There wasn't one scrap of evidence to support a Messiah being born in
Nazareth
.
They both knew He would be born in
Bethlehem
, the birthplace
of His father David.
All Philip could answer was, "Come and see."
V 47-48 "Jesus saw Nathanael coming to him, and saith of him, Behold an Israelite indeed, in whom is no guile!
48: Nathanael saith unto him, Whence knowest thou me?"
Apparently Nathanael, who must have overheard
Jesus’ comment, wasn't impressed.
Instead of responding with the normal amount
of courtesy, in so many words he said, We're strangers. How would you know that?
I think Jesus’ answer nearly blew him away. "Before that Philip called thee, when thou wast under the fig tree, I saw thee."
Well, there was no more talk of whether Jesus
was the Messiah or not.
V 49 "Nathanael answered and saith unto him, Rabbi,
thou art the Son of God; thou art the King of
Israel
."
What a response!
Such a confession on the part of the nation
would have brought in the kingdom!
I think Jesus was very pleased.
And I wouldn't be a bit surprised if He was
smiling when He replied, "Because I
said unto thee, I saw thee under the fig tree, believest thou? thou shalt see greater things than these."
"Verily,
verily, I say unto you, Hereafter ye shall see heaven
open, and the angels of God ascending and descending upon the Son of man."
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