Reflective Bible Study

It seems like such a long time since we began our year focusing in on John’s gospel, but we have now come to our special, two-part finale. As we take some time here at the end of the year to look back at what we’ve learned from this gospel, let me first wish all of you a Merry Christmas. While John’s gospel doesn’t focus on Jesus’ birth story like Matthew or Luke do, John’s gospel gives us a unique and powerful look into just how significant Jesus is. Because Jesus came, we all have the choice whether we accept His invitation and whether we accept His life and death to cover our sins.

We discovered a lot as we focused in on John’s gospel, and without any further delay, let’s begin diving into some of our biggest and best insights during the first half of our year focusing in on John’s gospel.

Let’s begin by looking at our insights in Episode 1. Episode 1 focused on the opening verses in John’s gospel and how Jesus existed before the world began. As we looked closely at this episode, we learned that Jesus willfully created the reason He would face the cross. John tells us that God’s glory is full of kindness and truth. God’s glory does not judge, put down, or condemn others. God’s glory shines the light of kindness and truth. We all have sinned and fallen short of God’s ideal. The sooner we realize that we are not any better than anyone else, the sooner Jesus can transform our lives with His glory, kindness, and truth!

Moving forward to episode 3, which focused in on Jesus’ first followers, we discover that Jesus’ early followers didn’t try to impress their friends with what Jesus had done, they simply invited them to come and see Jesus for themselves. When we share Jesus with others, the focus is not on us and the conversation isn’t about us. Instead, we focus on Jesus. We share what Jesus has done for us, we invite others to come and see, and when the focus stays on Jesus, God moves in amazing ways.

In the very next episode, number 4, which focused in on Jesus turning the water into wine, we learned that this miracle only happened because the servants had enough faith to obey Jesus’ ridiculous sounding request to serve the host water. The servants’ faith in Jesus, not knowing who Jesus even was, opened the door for this miracle!

This episode also reminded us that often times we don’t see God working in our hearts or our lives, but other people do. Other people are likely to see a greater change in our lives when we come to God or begin moving towards Him than we do. Jesus’ life, death, and resurrection solved the sin problem. Jesus supplied His life in exchange for ours. It is now up to us to accept Jesus’ gift and His invitation to substitute His life for ours.

Jumping ahead to episode 6, which focused in on Jesus’ conversation with Nicodemus, we discovered that those who have not been born spiritually are unable to see the Kingdom of God.

Also, while it isn’t pleasant to think about, we also are reminded that God’s judgment is reserved for those who do not believe in God’s one and only Son, Jesus. The way people reject Jesus is by preferring darkness and evil actions over coming into the light and letting Jesus wash away their sins. Jesus did not come into the world to fulfill the role of judge. Instead, Jesus came to this world to fulfill the role of God’s light, and Jesus’ presence separates those who want to seek God, His light, and His forgiveness, from those who reject God, prefer their sinful lives, and willingly choose to refuse the light God offers.

Whether we face judgment is 100% up to us. While it is unpopular in the world today, choosing Jesus in this life gives us a free pass to avoid the judgment when the world ends, and choosing Jesus in this life is done by leaving our sin-filled past in the past, and actively growing towards Jesus each and every day!

The very next episode, number 7, continued this thought when our passage focused on what John the Baptist preached about Jesus. In this episode, we learned that if we say we believe Jesus, but we are apathetic towards Him, we will forfeit our salvation. Obeying Jesus does not give us eternal life, because when we obey Jesus, the focus can easily turn off of Jesus and onto how well we are obeying Him. Our salvation is not based on anything we can do or have done. We are only saved because of what Jesus accomplished for us.

John the Baptist understood this amazing truth before Jesus had fully stepped into the public spotlight, and his declaration about Jesus, regardless of how popular or unpopular it is, formed the foundation for Jesus’ ministry, Jesus’ life, and Jesus’ death on behalf of you and me!

Moving forward a few episodes to episode 10, which focused on Jesus healing the man by the pool of Bethesda, we discovered the powerful truth that when God is our last hope, it is easy to look to Him. However, when God is not our first hope, we might not experience many miracles in our lives. When this man by this pool gave up hope in reaching the pool, which is something the other people present may not have been ready to do, he was ready to experience the healing Jesus offered him. When we give up hope in the things of this world and focus our faith on Jesus and what He accomplished for us, we are ready to receive miracles in our lives as well!

While we discovered lots of good insights in the next several episodes, what usually happens is that we must jump forward because I don’t want this episode to be too long. Because of this, let’s jumping forward all the way to episode 17, where we focused in on the first portion of Jesus teaching in the temple during a festival part way through His ministry. In this episode, we learned that if we choose to do what God wants, we will know whether Jesus’ teaching is from God or not. If we choose to ignore or reject doing what God wants, we will ultimately discount Jesus, His teaching, and everything about Him. According to Jesus, believing in Him is the clearest way to discover whether His teaching is from God or not. In other words, Jesus invites us to try life His way and when we accept Jesus’ challenge, we will discover personally whether Jesus’ way is best and whether Jesus really was who He claimed to be.

Moving forward to episode 20, our passage focused on a challenge the religious leaders bring Jesus about only being one witness. In this episode, Jesus emphasizes that without faith in Him, specifically faith in Jesus, everyone present, and we could also say everyone at any point in history, will die in their sins. Only through Jesus is a made way for us to trade our sins away. Jesus offers to take the punishment for our sins and in return, He offers us the life that He deserved – a life that can begin today and extend into eternity.

God loves us so much that Jesus came to take our place. Jesus not only became our Redeemer on the cross, Jesus also happens to be our Judge. This means that Satan’s accusations against us can simply be brushed aside by our Judge when we accept the gift of His sacrifice on our behalf, and let His perfect life cover our sins.

In the next episode, which is number 21, we looked at another challenge the religious leaders bring Jesus and an amazing promise Jesus shared about what we will gain when we believe in Him. In this episode, Jesus promises us that everyone who obeys His Words will never taste death. A truth we reject is one that we don’t apply into our lives, while a truth we believe is one that we will obey. By not obeying Jesus’ truth, we reject Him, and we step off of the path of discipleship. When we reject Jesus’ teachings, we lose out on not just discovering God’s truth and the freedom that comes with it, but we also lose out on the promise of never tasting eternal death as well.

To wrap up our first half of this year focusing in on John’s gospel, let’s look at some of our insights from episode 24, which focused on the crowd plainly asking Jesus if He was the Messiah and then wanting to stone Him for His answer. In this episode, which is a great one for us to conclude with, we learned that everything Jesus did was to bring glory to God and to uplift God’s name. Even the crowd acknowledged when they picked up stones to throw at Jesus that it wasn’t for anything He had done, but for one single claim He had made. The simple truth we can remember is that if God the Father did not like the message Jesus was sharing, there would be no way Jesus could have helped people during the time He was teaching, and preaching.

Let’s finish this first part of our year-end finale off with a challenge we learned from this episode: Because Jesus’ word has never failed, we can trust His promises, and even if we are uncertain of some of the more extreme claims Jesus made, we can look to Jesus’ actions as a foundation for our faith in Him.

When we are tempted to doubt, remember that Jesus came to redeem us, and the doubts we are tempted with are really Satan trying to knock us off the path God created for us!

I know you were expecting this week to begin wrapping up our past year of podcasts, however, after recording last week’s episode, I realized that this year has an extra Thursday, or an extra Monday in the case of the flashback episodes. Because of this, instead of taking a week off, which was one possible idea, I thought it might be neat to use these semi-regular extra days to insert a bonus episode every few years when this happens, and to use these bonus episodes to focus on some of the places Jesus shows up that are not specifically in the gospels.

With all that said, welcome to a bonus episode.

When we look for examples of Jesus being present in books other than the gospels, we don’t need to look any further for an example than the first few verses in the book of Acts. In Luke’s introduction to the book of Acts, he begins by sharing some verses about Jesus’ last days on earth to set the stage for what the disciples would do next. In these few verses, we discover some amazing things about Jesus and about His return that are worth us paying attention to.

Let’s read what Luke describes for us in the book of Acts, chapter 1, using the God’s Word Translation. Starting in verse 1, Luke writes:

¹ In my first book, Theophilus, I wrote about what Jesus began to do and teach. This included everything from the beginning of his life ² until the day he was taken to heaven. Before he was taken to heaven, he gave instructions through the Holy Spirit to the apostles, whom he had chosen.

³ After his death Jesus showed the apostles a lot of convincing evidence that he was alive. For 40 days he appeared to them and talked with them about God’s kingdom.

⁴ Once, while he was meeting with them, he ordered them not to leave Jerusalem but to wait there for what the Father had promised. Jesus said to them, “I’ve told you what the Father promises: ⁵ John baptized with water, but in a few days you will be baptized with the Holy Spirit.”

⁶ So when the apostles came together, they asked him, “Lord, is this the time when you’re going to restore the kingdom to Israel?”

⁷ Jesus told them, “You don’t need to know about times or periods that the Father has determined by his own authority. ⁸ But you will receive power when the Holy Spirit comes to you. Then you will be my witnesses to testify about me in Jerusalem, throughout Judea and Samaria, and to the ends of the earth.”

⁹ After he had said this, he was taken to heaven. A cloud hid him so that they could no longer see him.

¹⁰ They were staring into the sky as he departed. Suddenly, two men in white clothes stood near them. ¹¹ They asked, “Why are you men from Galilee standing here looking at the sky? Jesus, who was taken from you to heaven, will come back in the same way that you saw him go to heaven.”

¹² Then they returned to Jerusalem from the mountain called the Mount of Olives. It is near Jerusalem, about half a mile away.

In this passage, we get to see a little better overview picture of Jesus’ final days on earth before He returned to heaven. From just reading the gospels themselves, it might seem like Jesus was resurrected, popped in a few times to shock and surprise His disciples, before ultimately disappearing into heaven never to be seen from again.

However, from the way Luke introduces us to what Jesus’ post-resurrection days were like, he describes how Jesus regularly met with and spent time with the disciples. This happened for several weeks following the resurrection leading up to the event called the ascension, when Jesus officially returned to heaven.

As we read this passage, two different sections stood out in my mind that I want to draw our attention to.

The first part of our passage that stood out in my mind is when the disciples ask Jesus if this was the time when He would restore the Jewish nation. Jesus responded to their question with two big ideas. First, Jesus says in verse 7 that “You don’t need to know about times or periods that the Father has determined by his own authority.” Next, Jesus tells them in verse 8 that they “will receive power when the Holy Spirit comes to you. Then you will be my witnesses to testify about me in Jerusalem, throughout Judea and Samaria, and to the ends of the earth.”

In this two-verse response, we see a clear indicator where the disciples were placing their focus, and where Jesus challenges them to put their focus instead. In Jesus’ response, He challenges the disciples to not focus on the prophetic future events, but instead to focus on receiving the Holy Spirit and on being witnesses for Jesus throughout the whole world. In many ways, I think this is a challenge for all God’s people throughout the remainder of history. All God’s people should place a greater focus on receiving the Holy Spirit and on being Jesus’ witnesses in the world around us than we should place on figuring out the dates and times that are predicted in prophecy.

This does not mean we shouldn’t focus on prophecy. Instead, the challenge here is to not focus on understanding prophecy more than we focus on being witnesses to our world through the leading, guiding, and power of the Holy Spirit.

The other portion of this passage that stood out to me as we read this passage together is how Jesus leaves, and how the two men in white describe Jesus’ return. Luke describes Jesus’ departure simply by saying in verse 9, “he was taken to heaven. A cloud hid him so that they could no longer see him.”

This event happened on the Mount of Olives, and the men in white, who are understood to be angels that God sent with a message for the disciples, tell them that “Jesus, who was taken from you to heaven, will come back in the same way that you saw him go to heaven.”

Some people understand this to mean that when Jesus returns, He will come in a cloud, and then return to earth, setting His feet first on the Mount of Olives exactly where His feet left. However, this might be reading too much into the text. The only description we have of Jesus’ ascension is that He was hidden by a cloud from their sight. Only in the transition statement at the end of our passage do we discover where this event actually takes place.

The safest understanding of this passage is that Jesus’ return will be concealed with a cloud, before He ultimately becomes visible. Those in the first century did not understand Jesus’ return to be one that ends on earth. Instead, Paul tells us in 1 Thessalonians 4:16-17 that “The Lord will come from heaven with a command, with the voice of the archangel, and with the trumpet call of God. First, the dead who believed in Christ will come back to life. Then, together with them, we who are still alive will be taken in the clouds to meet the Lord in the air. In this way we will always be with the Lord.”

When Jesus returns, it will be in the same way that He left. He will be concealed in a cloud before becoming visible, and when He becomes visible, we will be caught up into the clouds to meet Him, both those of us who have died and those of us who are still alive when He returns.

We have no idea when God’s timing for Jesus’ return will actually be, nor should we put a lot of focus on trying to figure this out. Instead, like Jesus challenged His disciples to do, we should focus instead on receiving the Holy Spirit and being witnesses for Jesus!

As we come to the end of this bonus episode, here are the challenges I will leave you with:

As always, be sure to seek God first and to focus each day on asking the Holy Spirit to lead, guide, and be present in your lives, and then live each day as a witness for Jesus. Live your life in a way that brings God glory and praise.

Also, as I always challenge you to do, continue to pray and study the Bible for yourself to learn exactly what God wants you to learn. While other people can give you ideas to think about, always take what you learn and study it out from the Bible with prayer to determine if it is spiritual truth. Through prayer, Bible Study, and living a life that glorifies God, we will be the best witnesses we can be for Him here on this earth.

And as I end every set of challenges by saying in one way or another, never let life derail you from living the life God has planned for you to live, and never stop short of where God wants to lead you to in your life with Him!