Jn 5:17- 20 Jesus said to them, "My Father is always at his work to this very day, and I, too, am working…… I tell you the truth, the Son can do nothing by himself; he can do only what he sees his Father doing, because whatever the Father does the Son also does. For the Father loves the Son and shows him all he does.”

It is a common thought among Christians to wonder about God's activity, for it seems sometimes as if the Lord is still and quiet and doing nothing, but we'll suggest from the outset that this perception is either because He hides His activity from us, or we simply aren't looking. The reason for saying this is in these verses today.

Jesus makes a quite remarkable comment: My Father is always at his work. Add to that his comment that the Son can do nothing by himself; he can do only what he sees his Father doing and you realize, looking at the number of things Jesus did, that the Father must be very busy. Indeed when you consider John's comment at the end of his Gospel, “Jesus did many other things as well. If every one of them were written down, I suppose that even the whole world would not have room for the books that would be written” (Jn 21:25), you realize just a little of how much the Father is doing. The Father instigated and the Son implemented. Does the Lord do just as much today? Yes, why not? It's just that we don't see it. As we've said previously in these meditations, we need to learn to observe when the Father is working. That person who suddenly starts asking questions about the Christian faith after years of no interest, why are they doing it? The Father is prompting them. Why do you sometimes find yourself thinking about faith issues? Because the Father is prompting. Why do people venture out in great new faith ventures? Because the Father is prompting.

So here we see Jesus declaring that he only does what he sees his Father in heaven doing. It is a perfect partnership. If you didn't take in what we said earlier, here it is again: the Father instigates and the Son implements. The Father had the perfect overall picture and therefore know who was ready for what and conveys that to the Son in the limited human body, who then stretches out, speaks a word and brings about what is on the Father's heart.

The apostle Paul said, “we are God's fellow workers” (1 Cor 3:9) conveying the same idea. (Also 2 Cor 6:1). It is this same idea of partnership, working alongside God to do His bidding here on the earth. What are the requirements to be one of God's fellow workers? Well, first of all it has to be availability. You may remember the writer to the Hebrews: “when Christ came into the world, he said: Sacrifice and offering you did not desire, but a body you prepared for me; with burnt offerings and sin offerings you were not pleased. Then I said, ‘Here I am--it is written about me in the scroll-- I have come to do your will , O God'.” (Heb 10:5-7). Jesus accepted that the Father had given him a human body so that he could do God's will on the earth – availability! The second thing has to be a sensitivity to the prompting of the Holy Spirit, for that is how the Father conveys His intentions to us. Yes, He may convey His will through His word, through other people and through circumstances, but for the daily moment by moment service, the Father looks for our availability and your sensitivity to His leading. When He finds that He leads and we follow as His co-workers, just as Jesus showed us (Jn 14:12 ).

Jn 5:22-23 Moreover, the Father judges no one, but has entrusted all judgment to the Son, that all may honour the Son just as they honour the Father. He who does not honour the Son does not honour the Father, who sent him.

To honour someone is to respect or highly esteem them and more often than not we show it by some act of deference. We honour people because of who they are and what they have achieved. In this sense God is to be honoured above all others. We express our recognition of this honour by worshipping Him.

When a country sends an ambassador, the way the host country treats the ambassador is an indication of what they feel about the sending country. If they honour the sending country, they will honour the ambassador. Giving honour is an indication of the high feelings you have about that person, and honouring their representative is exactly the same.

In our verses today Jesus starts by speaking about judgement and makes a strange sounding statement: the Father judges no one. Now that is strange because from early on in the Bible (Gen 18:25 ) God is seen as a Judge. So how it is now, that Jesus says that the Father judges no one? The answer comes in what follows: but has entrusted all judgment to the Son. Individual judgement, says Jesus rests in him. Does that mean that he assesses each person on their works? No, for those who have heard of Jesus, their judgement depends on how they have responded to Jesus. The basis of judgement today is upon how an individual responded to the news of Jesus. Even a child at Sunday School, or even ordinary school, who hears mention of Jesus is judged on their response to him. Even if his name is just used as a swear word people have heard his name in our society. Do they wonder about it, do they go searching to find out about this name, and having read of him, have their hearts been stirred? Their responses to the name and person of Jesus Christ reveals something about what is there on the inside. It is that response, or the lack of it, that judges each person.

In these verses judgement and honour are tightly bound together. If you hear about Jesus, go finding out about him and have your heart lifted by him, you are honouring him for who he is and you are assessed or judged on the basis of that honouring. Those who have hearts to seek God will, when they hear of Jesus, realise who he is and honour him in the same way that they honour God in their hearts, thus they honour the Son just as they honour the Father. Indeed if they don't honour the Son that is an indication of the state of their heart and an indication of what they feel about God and so He who does not honour the Son does not honour the Father. Jesus revealed the Father by his character, his nature and by everything that he did. If we are too blind to see this, then it shows that our hearts are blind to God. The truth is that we judge ourselves. Someone has given the example of a person going to hear a piece of great music and, coming out, they criticise it and say how they didn't enjoy it. This is not a criticism of the great music but a revelation that the person in question either doesn't understand music or doesn't have music in them. Similarly the man or woman who can read all about this wonderful person who walked the earth two thousand years ago, and remain cold towards him, reveals their inability to appreciate goodness and holiness and perfection. They judge themselves when they fail to honour the Son and the One who sent him.

Jn 5:36,37 “I have testimony weightier than that of John. For the very work that the Father has given me to finish, and which I am doing, testifies that the Father has sent me. And the Father who sent me has himself testified concerning me.”

In a court room a testimony is the evidence of a witness to a person's character and capability. A person who is asked to testify on behalf of another, is someone who knows that other and is able to speak up on their behalf to conform the sort of person they are. The question that is in so many people's minds is who is Jesus? If the whole world would realize who he is, it would transform the world. The excuse that so many will use is, nobody told me, yet the truth is that the Bible is the world's number one best seller and there are millions of copies in non-believers' homes and the Bible brings us the evidence of Jesus. John the Gospel writer, particularly, holds nothing back in his effort to convince his readers. For the people there in Jesus' day one of the clearest witnesses to Jesus was John the Baptist, as we've seen in previous meditations. But, says Jesus, there is an even stronger witness who speaks and acts on my behalf, my heavenly Father. We've already seen a number of times the relationship between the Father and His Son, and the way Jesus responded to the Father's prompting to do the Father's will. Here we see that again but with a different emphasis.

You want to know who I am, says Jesus? Then look at what I'm doing and you'll realize where I must come from. Jesus' words to John the Baptist's disciples portray him well: “Jesus replied, "Go back and report to John what you hear and see: The blind receive sight, the lame walk, those who have leprosy are cured, the deaf hear, the dead are raised, and the good news is preached to the poor” (Mt 11:4,5) Similarly in Luke's Gospel in the synagogue in Capernaum Jesus read out and applied to himself the Isaiah prophecy: “The Spirit of the Lord is on me, because he has anointed me to preach good news to the poor. He has sent me to proclaim freedom for the prisoners and recovery of sight for the blind, to release the oppressed, to proclaim the year of the Lord's favour” (Lk 4:18,19). Later on Jesus was to say, “Do not believe me unless I do what my Father does. But if I do it, even though you do not believe me, believe the miracles, that you may know and understand that the Father is in me, and I in the Father.” (Jn 10,37,38). Not sure who Jesus is? Look at the things he did, the healings, the raising people from the dead, the delivering people from demons, walking on water, turning water into wine, feeding thousands with a few loaves, all these things speak for themselves.

All these things point to one thing, says Jesus, that I am sent by my Father (i.e. God). Why? Well let the words of Nicodemus, leader, scholar and conservative Jew speak the answer: “Rabbi, we know you are a teacher who has come from God. For no one could perform the miraculous signs you are doing if God were not with him” (Jn 3:2). No it's more than that Nicodemus; this is the Son of God sent from heaven with a purpose, and with all the power and authority of heaven at his disposal. He's got a purpose and it is to reveal his Father through the things he does. He's been sent from heaven to reveal the Father and then die as a sacrifice for the sins of the world. Sometimes people feel their life is an accident. That isn't true and it's certainly not true of Jesus. He was and is the Son of God who has left his home in heaven, sent by the Father with a purpose decreed before the foundation of the world itself. He is the most purposeful figure in history, this Sent One!

Jn 6:10,11 Jesus said, "Have the people sit down." There was plenty of grass in that place, and the men sat down, about five thousand of them. Jesus then took the loaves, gave thanks, and distributed to those who were seated as much as they wanted. He did the same with the fish.

They say the basic problem in Economics is the scarcity of resources; there is never enough to go round. That would summarise the situation in this story from which today's verses are taken. At least five thousand people have been listening to Jesus' teaching, it is the end of the day, the people are hungry and the only food around are five small loaves and two fish (v.9). To say this food was ‘not enough to go round' would be the understatement of the year. As Andrew had just said, “ how far will they go among so many? ” There is a massive need and only tiny resources.

So what does Jesus do? He simply gives thanks to his Father for the provision and starts breaking the bread up and handing it out, and handing it out, and handing it out, and… The Synoptic Gospels each tell us that actually Jesus handed the food to the disciples and they did the actual distribution. John makes the point that the actual miracle was performed by Jesus, for this is clearly what this was.

There are those who suggest that when Jesus handed out the little they had it shamed the crowd into taking out the food they had with them, but there is no indication whatsoever that that is what happened, and perhaps to counter that speculation John adds, “After the people saw the miraculous sign that Jesus did, they began to say, "Surely this is the Prophet who is to come into the world." Jesus, knowing that they intended to come and make him king by force, withdrew again to a mountain by himself.” (Jn 6:14,15). First he declares it was a ‘miraculous' sign, and second he remembers that the crowd were so amazed by it that they realized he was someone special sent by God and wanted to make him their king. There would not have been this response if it had not been a clear miracle.

We make this observation because there are always people who try to explain away as normal the miracles of Jesus. Why do people do this? We suggest two reasons? The sinful nature that we all struggle with is still godless and self-centred and so doubt always springs up if we let it. Not only that, the truth is that if people accept these things as miracles, they also have to accept Jesus as being utterly different from any other world leader and especially different from any other world religious leader. It's not only the Cross of Christ that people object to; it's also the miraculous nature of his ministry.

Oh yes, it wasn't just an occasional thing but regular, daily miracles. We're only told of a very limited number of the spectacular miracles, e.g. turning water into wine, walking on water etc., but there were also a number of instances of Jesus raising the dead, and then of course, countless miracles of healing, which included enabling the blind to see, the deaf to hear, the dumb to talk, the lame to walk and many lepers cleansed. These were the things that made up the daily expression of his ministry, day in, day out for three years. Put aside the Cross and the Resurrection if you will for a moment; these daily miracles of Jesus mark him out as unique in history.

You still struggle with these things? Well if you accept that he is the Son of God, why should it be a problem for God who created all of existence with a word, to simply bring changes into that material world – by a word through His Son?

Jn 6:19,20 When they had rowed three or three and a half miles, they saw Jesus approaching the boat, walking on the water; and they were terrified. But he said to them, ‘It is I; don't be afraid'”

Seeing people in their ordinary context is perfectly normal. Seeing people in a different context than you usually see them means you sometimes don't recognize them. Seeing people in a totally impossible context is downright scary! Jesus has sent the disciples off in a boat across the Sea of Galilee . It is night time and there is a strong wind and therefore it is quite choppy. Because of the gusty wind, they row and have now rowed about three and a half miles. Suddenly, presumably by the light of the moon, they see Jesus walking towards them – on the water! This is impossible, but it was! These hardened fishermen and tax collectors etc. are terrified. Most of us would have been! This is Jesus utterly out of context. This can't be happening, we're at sea!

Now yesterday we considered how people try to rationalize Jesus' miracles and explain them away. So how do the skeptics explain this one away? Well they say, they were obviously close to the land because they landed soon after Jesus got in the boat and so it is probable that Jesus walked round the lake and walked out to them on a sand spit that was only just covered with water and so it appeared that he was walking on water.

Problem Number 1: the boat would have crossed the lake in a straight line. To walk round the lake would have been a much longer distance and would have taken much longer.

Problem Number 2: half the men in this boat are fishermen who have spent their lives on this lake and would know it and would certainly know and see if Jesus was walking on a sand spit, especially at the point he climbed into their wildly rocking boat! Oh no, this is as John has told it, and he had been one of the fishermen, and he recounts this clearly with the intention of conveying it as a miraculous happening. (NB. Mark recounting this story says they were in the middle of the lake – Mk 6:47 – and so the arriving at shore immediately Jesus is aboard, is seen by some as a further miracle of provision)

Let's ask the question again that we concluded with yesterday: if you accept that he is the Son of God, why should it be a problem for God who created all of existence with a word, to simply bring changes into that material world – by a word through His Son? And now in the light of this story, why should it be so difficult for God to enable His Son to do things that run contrary to the laws of the material world? God designed and created water, so why does it seem difficult that he can give Jesus the ability to walk on it. Remember he also gave Peter that same ability for as short while (Mt 14:29). If Jesus can change water into wine, why is it difficult to believe he can walk on water? If Jesus brought dead bodies back to life after hours of death, why is it so difficult to believe he could walk on water? The fact is that one miracle is no greater than another. Once you grasp the fact that God through His Son can do things contrary to His original design for the material world and the people in it, there is no problem. No, the problem is the basic one of believing Jesus to be the Son of God, divinity with the power over this world. Before that, the starting place is believing that there is a God who is the Creator-Designer of this world who is all-powerful and can still do what He likes with it. God who is Creator, and Jesus His Son; these are the building blocks of belief in miracles. Once you have arrived there, all that is left is to worship him.

Jn 6:33-35    For the bread of God is he who comes down from heaven and gives life to the world." "Sir," they said, "from now on give us this bread." Then Jesus declared, "I am the bread of life. He who comes to me will never go hungry, and he who believes in me will never be thirsty.

We have previously picked up on the picture language that Jesus used and was reported by John. The context of our verses today takes us back to the incident of the feeding of the five thousand. When the Jews catch up with Jesus on the other side of the lake, he says, "I tell you the truth, you are looking for me, not because you saw miraculous signs but because you ate the loaves and had your fill.” (6:26). In other words they realize Jesus can provide food for them. He continued, “Do not work for food that spoils, but for food that endures to eternal life, which the Son of Man will give you” (v.27), i.e. make the focus of your lives getting food that gives eternal life. They ask what this work is and he says it is to believe in the One God has sent (v.28,29). They realize he is referring to himself and so ask him what miraculous sign he can give. After all, they continue, what's wrong with material provision (implied) because God provided manna in the wilderness for us when He took us out of Egypt (v.30,31). It wasn't Moses who gave it, says Jesus, it was God, just as He gives the true bread from heaven (v.32). All right, they say, give us this true bread from heaven that gives eternal life.

The language so far is quite clear that the Jews are talking about material, physical bread that sustains life. We need food to stay alive. Jesus now pivots this thinking and turns it to suggest that the true bread is a person, ‘he who comes down from heaven'. They seem to struggle with this change of meaning and simply ask to be given this life source. It is at this point that Jesus comes out with the first of the so-called, “I am” sayings in John's Gospel (see also 8:12; 9:5; 10:7,9; 10:11,14; 11:25; 14:6; 15:1,5). Now the significance of these sayings is in the “I am” for “I am” was the revealed name of God to Moses (see Ex 3:13 -15). Undercover Jesus is claiming to be God and later the Jews realize this and get very upset.

Yet here we have Jesus making this first ‘I am' claim – I am the bread of life. What is he saying in this picture language? Well, we have noted that bread sustains life and is needed for us to grow, develop and stay alive and so Jesus is saying, if you want to have your spiritual hunger satisfied and receive life that will go on eternally, then here I am, your food to be received, taken in and absorbed.

Yes, we really need to understand this. If our bodies are to receive sustenance from food, and bread is often referred to as ‘the staff of life' the very basic of food, then we have to take it, chew it, take it into our stomach and digest it so that it is turned into energy. In other words it becomes one with us. Thus when we come to Jesus, we have to receive him (believe in him for who he really is) and invite him into our lives so that, as he puts his Holy Spirit within us, we become one with him. It is his life energy in us that gives us this life that goes on and on and on. But more than that, it not only sustains us but satisfies us. So many people have testified that when they came to Christ and received him into their lives, all of their concerns, their wonderings and anxieties (hunger) were laid to rest and they found a new peace – satisfaction – in the experience of knowing him. This ‘bread' truly transforms!

Jn 6:68,69 Simon Peter answered him, "Lord, to whom shall we go? You have the words of eternal life. We believe and know that you are the Holy One of God."

It is a strange thing but two different people can hear the same words and understand them in completely different ways. No more is this true than in the spiritual dimension and in respect of Jesus and all he said and did. We have commented on this before but it needs repeating. Consider what was happening in the circumstances that bring about Peter's comment in our verse today.

As we saw yesterday, Jesus had been speaking about himself being the bread that had come down from heaven. Near the end of that teaching he said, “Whoever eats my flesh and drinks my blood has eternal life, and I will raise him up at the last day. For my flesh is real food and my blood is real drink. Whoever eats my flesh and drinks my blood remains in me, and I in him.” (Jn 6:54-56). Now what is intriguing is that it was some of his disciples who struggled with this: “On hearing it, many of his disciples said, "This is a hard teaching. Who can accept it?” (v.60). Jesus responded with, “The words I have spoken to you are spirit and they are life. Yet there are some of you who do not believe." For Jesus had known from the beginning which of them did not believe” (v.63,64). There were those who had apparently come with him but who, in honesty, didn't really believe in him. They had heard all he had said but still didn't believe and so, “From this time many of his disciples turned back and no longer followed him” (v.66) Now isn't that amazing? These followers had been with Jesus, seen the miracles he had done and heard the things he had taught, but had been unmoved by them and had walked away!

Jesus turned to the twelve and asked, “ You do not want to leave too, do you?” (v.67) and it is to that question that Peter responds in our verses above. Peter and the others in the twelve had heard Jesus speak and, unlike those others who had left, they saw Jesus' words as conveying life – eternal life! They saw something, they understood something that the others hadn't, that what Jesus had to say revealed the way to God that brought a life that would go on and on after the one on this earth ended. Even more than that, they realized that these words revealed who Jesus really was, the One from God. The words and the person who spoke them convinced these twelve to stick around, for here, with them, was the answer to life.

Again, isn't that incredible, that both groups of people heard the same words and one group didn't understand and so rejected them, while the other group saw, understood and accepted them! What was the difference? It has to be what we call the state of their hearts. One group were critical and self-concerned and so couldn't see. The other group had surrendered their lives to follow Jesus and because of this there was an openness to Jesus that meant that the Holy Spirit could reveal to them the deep truths that he was speaking.

How do you view Jesus' words? Are they the most important words that have ever been spoken on the earth, or do you criticize, judge and reject them? Have you seen that these words open the way to receive eternal life, and that in fact when we receive them they impart that special dimension of life to us on a daily basis? They feed us, transform us, build us, encourage us, release us and free us, for that is what this ‘life' that Jesus imparts does. Have we ‘seen' them like this?

Jn 7:33,34    Jesus said, "I am with you for only a short time, and then I go to the one who sent me. You will look for me, but you will not find me; and where I am, you cannot come."

Awareness of time and of timing, we've already noted in previous meditations, was part of Jesus' life and ministry. Most of us would pray for a long life (e.g. Psa 61:6, 143:11, or Prov 3:2) for death is not something we welcome. We are very attached to this world and don't want to let it go. The thought of some other ‘existence' creates fear in many of us. For Jesus this was very different!

We have seen a number of times how Jesus was aware of having come from heaven to fulfil his Father's specific will, a plan developed from before the beginning of time. For Jesus, the end was not to be a long life with a happy retirement, enjoying the fruit of many years hard work. For Jesus the years of his Father's ministry would be three short years in which the lives of thousands would be transformed. As we've seen recently there were dramatic transformations under Jesus' ministry. If we had been planning Jesus' life we would have suggested that he continue on for a number more years – after all, think of the number of people you could heal in those additional years, people from lots of different nations. For us, we would have been carried away with the present, carried away with the incredible things we saw Jesus doing. If it had been us we would have ensured that he built on what he was doing and extended it to touch many more lives.

But then we wouldn't have had the mind of the Father in heaven; we wouldn't have realised that these three years of ministry were simply to establish Jesus' initial credibility, and reveal just a little of the Father's love, as he prepared a team to carry on after he had died. Ah yes, there is the heart of the matter: Jesus planned to die as a sacrifice to carry the sin of the world. This was the one thing he could do that no one else could do. Yes, the apostles could carry on doing the ministry work of Jesus – preaching, teaching, healing and delivering people from demons, but only the unique Son of God could die in our place to carry our sin to hell and take our punishment so that we might be forgiven. No one else could do this; no one else was big enough, no one else was perfect, free from sin to start with. No one else could be the ‘lamb without blemish'.

So here, in our verses today, we find Jesus, very much aware of his mission and aware of the limited time he had left. There is no room for doubt over his words. “I am with you for only a short time.” He knew this was a short-term contract. “and then I go to the one who sent me.” He knew that after death he would be returning to his Father in heaven, from whom he had come. “You will look for me, but you will not find me.” He would not be anywhere his disciples could find him. There was no question of following him to watch him carry on somewhere else. “where I am, you cannot come.!” He's not going abroad; he's leaving this existence and returning to his home in heaven. That had been the plan from the start; that had been the planning from the foundation of the world. He came from heaven, born of a woman, grew up until he reached the age of thirty, moved into his Father in heaven's work for three years, then died on the Cross of Calvary to carry our sins, rose from the dead and ascended back to heaven. No old age in retirement for Jesus; his time here was strictly limited, according to The Plan!

Jn 8:3-5,7   The teachers of the law and the Pharisees brought in a woman caught in adultery. They made her stand before the group and said to Jesus, “Teacher, this woman was caught in the act of adultery. In the Law Moses commanded us to stone such women. Now what do you say?”….. he straightened up and said to them, “If any one of you is without sin, let him be the first to throw a stone at her.”

We commented in an earlier meditation on the well-known instruction, “Do to others as you would have them do to you.” (Lk 6:31), as we considered the way Jesus dealt with the woman at the well in Samaria. Jesus there had expressed the love, care and compassion of the Father as he dealt with that woman in her need. We identify with the people Jesus encountered, because we too fail, we too get it wrong and we too desire to be cared for with compassion at these times.

But then we find we are walking on secure ground and we dare to feel righteous and we dare to look down on those who are failing and getting it wrong. How easy it is to feel superior when we seem to be getting it right for the moment. For the moment we forget our frailty and we forget our weakness and our propensity to fail and we feel we are ‘better' than those who aren't handling life so well at the moment. At that point in time we step into the shoes of the Pharisees, that group of conservative, legalistic, religious people, and we forget who we really are.

In this story there are, in fact, two groups of needy people. There is the woman caught in adultery and the Pharisees. At this point in time, we could be either group. The woman was in need of forgiveness and of restoration in her life. There appears no question about her guilt. Jesus doesn't say she is not guilty. This is not about pretending that she hadn't done anything wrong for she had. This was about how we all view her. The Pharisees were in need of having their perspective on life being readjusted. How could Jesus have dealt with both groups?

Well he could have strongly condemned the woman openly, to make a public example of her because she is a symbol of a people rejecting God's laws (Ex 20:14 ). She IS a sinner! As for the Pharisees they are right according to the Law but they are hard hearted against both this woman (who they are using for their own purposes) and against Jesus who they want to bring down. There are some less than virtuous motivations behind what they are doing and saying. If they had come, genuinely seeking wisdom from Jesus, saying, “Lord we've caught this woman in adultery but our hearts don't wish to kill her, how can we deal with her?” that might have been a quite different thing, but they didn't. They came, sacrificing her for their own ends. So what does Jesus do?

He first of all deals with their problem. Fine, he says, you're right (by implication) so anyone without sin, you be the first one to cast the stone to start her execution. Wow! Hold on! Dare I say publicly that I'm without sin, that I never get it wrong? Of course I can't. This has gone terribly wrong. I need to get out of here! One by one they quietly leave. When the last one has gone, Jesus gently turns to the woman and tells her, “Go now, and leave your life of sin.” (v.11). She is given a new opportunity, but it is to live righteously. The gentle teacher has so gently put all of them back onto a right path – of viewing themselves rightly and of living rightly. That was his goal.

Jn 8:12 When Jesus spoke again to the people, he said, "I am the light of the world. Whoever follows me will never walk in darkness, but will have the light of life."

In the fourth meditation we considered Jesus as the light of the world coming into its darkness. Here we see Jesus making this bold declaration to all the people. It was an open and public proclamation for all to hear and think about. If someone says they are the light of the world what do they mean?

What does light do? First of all it dispels the darkness. That almost sounds so obvious that it hardly seems worth saying, but it is of vital importance. Darkness is what surrounds every person who does not know God. The world is closed in and small, oppressive, and a struggle. There is fear, doubt, anguish and evil. One doesn't have to look far to know that this is an evil and, therefore, a fearful world. It is dark. And then Jesus the Son of God comes and stands against all evil, all fear and all anguish. He is not afraid of it and before him it all has to fall back. When Jesus comes into our lives, the first thing that happens is that evil, sin, bad, call it what you will, falls back and is dispelled. Many new Christians testify to feeling clean and free from past oppressions.

But if the first thing light does is dispel darkness, the second thing it does it reveal or show the world around us as it truly is. When a light comes on in a dark room, the room is revealed. When the sun rises and night is ended, the world is revealed. When Jesus comes to us, suddenly we can ‘see'! Suddenly we understand the world in a new way. We ‘see' that it is God's world but we also ‘see' that men are sinful, and then we ‘see' God's salvation through Jesus, and we ‘see' the wonder of what that means, and we ‘see' that we are cleansed, forgiven, empowered and adopted, and we ‘see' there is now purpose and destiny in our lives.

Yes, there in those final words of that last paragraph is the next thing that light does: it shows us a way ahead. It shows us that there is a positive future here on this earth and an eternal destiny in heaven with God. But it does more than that; it doesn't only show there is future hope, it shows the immediate path ahead. The light shines and reveals where we place our feet. It shows us where to walk and how to walk so that our footsteps are secure and we don't fall. When Jesus comes into our lives we realize we have a future hope, but we also find he shows us, in himself and in his teaching, a model for living that focuses on love, goodness, righteousness and godliness. These general expressions of how we may live are shown to us and we see a completely different life that is now possible. But more than that, we find he shines on the present and the immediate future and we have a new confidence in taking the next step forward. The detailed path lit up by the light doesn't normally shine very far ahead, but again and again we find that the next steps are made clear. As he shines in and on our lives, suddenly circumstances and people become clear and we ‘know' or ‘see' what to do or say, how to respond, how to move in confidence because of the clarity of what is given.

This, as Jesus said, is the light of life. This ‘light' is in fact, Jesus' life . It is his presence that reveals the world for what it is, it is his love that conveys future purpose, it is his words that indicate the immediate steps ahead, it is his presence that reveals the reality of circumstances and people. It is his life that actually shines in the darkness and reveals everything as it truly is. He is the light, his life is the light. Live in the light.

Jn 8:58     I tell you the truth," Jesus answered, "before Abraham was born, I am!"

We have considered how Jesus used picture language or enigmatic teaching and here in this one short verse we find that rising to a peak, but to see its significance we really need to put it in context and go back over a long passage. It starts with the Pharisees challenging Jesus (v.13) and at the end of that we find: “Even as he spoke, many put their faith in him” (v.30). We then find, “To the Jews who had believed him, Jesus said, "If you hold to my teaching, you are really my disciples. Then you will know the truth, and the truth will set you free.” (v.31,32). It's like Jesus was saying, “Don't just think good of me, obey me, and then you'll be free.” Their belief in Jesus hasn't gone very deep for their response is one of hostility. Basically their response is, “What do you mean? We are free already. We are Abraham's descendents and we were delivered out of Egypt and were made a free nation.” Jesus then speaks about needing to be freed from sin and concludes, “I am telling you what I have seen in the Father's presence, and you do what you have heard from your father.” (v.38)

He understands that they have not yet come to true belief and that Satan (v.44) is their true ‘father'. They aren't sure what he means and declare, “Abraham is our father” i.e. we're true Jews! (v.39). They then enter into a long argument about who their true father is and eventually Jesus says, “ Your father Abraham rejoiced at the thought of seeing my day; he saw it and was glad.” (v.56) to which they reply, “‘You are not yet fifty years old,' the Jews said to him, ‘and you have seen Abraham!'” (v.57), which brings us to Jesus' powerful declaration in our verse today. Their understanding is quite clear for, “At this, they picked up stones to stone him, but Jesus hid himself, slipping away from the temple grounds.” (v.59)

So what has gone on here? It seemed that some of the Jews believed in Jesus but when the matter of obedience came up they weren't yet at that level of discipleship. In a debate on whether they were real Jews with Abraham as their father, Jesus reveals that he knew Abraham which really upsets them. Out of this comes Jesus' claim that might be put, “Before Abraham was born, I existed.” i.e. I am eternal, I am God, and so with that apparent blasphemy claim they go to stone him.

In Meditation 38 we looked at the first of the “I Am” sayings of Jesus found only in John's Gospel and listed all the others. In Meditation 42 when we looked at the second “I Am” we didn't emphasise that aspect of it but here in this episode the “I Am” comes at the end of a statement, as if to emphasise it. It's almost as if Jesus wants to purposefully let this claim come out into the open. Being so enigmatic these claims were missed by the earlier Gospel writers, but it was only as John pondered on these things over the years that he saw their significance. In his Gospel more than any of the Gospels he portrays Jesus as the Son of God, the eternal Son of God who has no beginning or end in time-space history.

That is the only conclusion that we can be left with, with such a specific claim as we have in our verse today. God revealed Himself to Moses as the “I Am” (Ex 3:14), the Eternal One, the One who exists throughout all that we call time, who is always here, wherever it may be in history, the one who is everywhere in space whenever it may be in history. That is what “I Am” conveys, the eternal nature of God and when Jesus speaks as he does in this situation with these Jews, he is saying the same thing. As the Son of God he exists throughout history, not just for 33 years nearly 2000 years ago. Worship him.

Jn 9:3-5   "Neither this man nor his parents sinned," said Jesus, "but this happened so that the work of God might be displayed in his life. As long as it is day, we must do the work of him who sent me. Night is coming, when no one can work. While I am in the world, I am the light of the world."

In Meditations 4 & 42 to have already considered Jesus as the light of the world and so you be left wondering why we are looking at it again. The answer is because John saw it as so important as to mention light many times, and therefore so should we. In Meditation 4 we considered that light opposes darkness and brings revelation. In Meditation 42 we amplified that and noted that it shows us the way and the light here was actually Jesus life . In our verses today Jesus talks about day and night. Day is all about light and night is all about darkness. Jesus went on to imply that it was ‘day' because he was there and because he was there it was his light that made it day. He hinted at the coming of ‘night' when he would not be there. This takes us right back to chapter 1 of John's Gospel where John suggests that the world is in darkness (1:5). He reiterates this suggestion in his first letter (1 Jn 2:8,9). Indeed prior to that he said, “This is the message we have heard from him and declare to you: God is light; in him there is no darkness at all. If we claim to have fellowship with him yet walk in the darkness, we lie and do not live by the truth.” (1 Jn 1:5,6). Thus, for John, ungodliness and unrighteousness (living out of communion with God and living sinfully) is darkness and that is how the world is without Jesus. When Jesus comes to us, if we let him in to our lives, his light brings transformation – fellowship with God and right living.

To emphasise this truth even more Jesus' words in our verses above are followed by an action that is both miraculous and revelatory in more than one sense. To cut a long story short Jesus gives the blind man back his sight. To say ‘give back' is not strictly accurate because the man was born blind and therefore has never ever seen light. Now he is a graphic image of what happens to us as individuals within the human race. We are all born ‘in sin'; we inherited it from our parents, which is why John says in his first letter, “ If we claim to be without sin, we deceive ourselves .” (1 Jn 1:8). So, however nice or good we are, we all have this tendency to self-centredness (godlessness) and to doing our own thing which veers more and more away from God's design for living for us. This is what John refers to as darkness. That is not being unkind to any individual, group or race, it applies to every single human being, we are all the same, we are all in ‘darkness' until Jesus, the Light, comes and shines in us.

The picture of the blind man given his sight portrays well the incredible transformation that comes when Jesus comes into someone's life. One moment they could not see – they were just feeling around in an uncertain world, scrabbling to find the truth, struggling to put meaning to everything. As early as Plato's Republic men had this sense of only seeing life as a shadow or reflection. Plato's ‘Cave' was underground with the sense of darkness prevailing. Man has this sense yet is unable to reach the light or let the light shine into blind eyes. It is only when the true light comes into our lives do we start ‘seeing'. Only then does the world really start making sense, only as his life lives in us, does he bring us understanding and we truly see. This is no mystical cult, this is the Faith that is open to anyone who will come to him and receive him into their lives. Light!

Jn 10:7 Jesus said again, "I tell you the truth, I am the gate for the sheep.

There are times in the Gospels when you almost feel sorry for the Pharisees, these intellectual, conservative, religious people who had thought they had everything so neatly mapped out, for Jesus comes along with such simple language and manages to say such profound things that their minds must have been left in complete confusion. At the end of the previous chapter, after the healing of the man blind from birth, the Pharisees challenge Jesus and get into dialogue with him. Suddenly Jesus switches metaphors and starts speaking about sheep, the sheep fold and the shepherd.

Immediately their minds must have been thinking, what is he now saying? What do we know about sheep? In the past God was referred to as the Shepherd of Israel (Psa 80:1), Israel's spiritual leaders were referred to as shepherds (Isa 56:10,11) and were denounced (Ezek 34) but Israel were promised a messianic shepherd (Ezek 34:23). Right this is the context, what next?

Now Jesus is talking about the sheep pen and those trying to get into it without going through the gate. What does he mean? He's obviously referring to us Pharisees. Is he saying we're trying to get into God's kingdom without going through the gate? Well what is the gate he's referring to? So then we come to verse 7 and Jesus gives them the answer: “I am the gate”.

So let's just check this again: the sheepfold is God's kingdom, and the sheep are God's people, obviously, and the gate is the way in to the kingdom. Well surely we would expect the way in to God's kingdom to be repentance, like John preached, together with obedience and righteousness, keeping the Law that God has already given. That is the Jewish way, that is how it has always been. But now Jesus is saying that he is the way in to God's kingdom? What does he mean? As you look carefully into the dialogue that follows there is no description of this gate (or door). It seems to remain a mystery until you remember that in Israel , in these open-air sheep folds, there were simple walls to keep the sheep together, with a single opening where the shepherd himself sat, as the door. The door was the shepherd. Jesus was therefore saying he is the shepherd? Yes, for he goes on to say that, but don't miss the point he's making here first of all.

Although it's not explained here, it is a general teaching that Jesus brought: “No one comes to the Father except through me.” (Jn 14:6). Although we might like to be generous and think that there are routes to God through other religions, Jesus doesn't give us that option. He makes this clear claim to uniqueness of access to God: “I am the gate, no one comes to the Father except through me.” How do we come through Jesus? Obviously the first thing is to believe he is who he said he was, the unique Son of God sent to redeem the world – including me. Second we have to believe he did what he said he would do, die for the sins of the world, including mine. Third we have to want that to apply for me personally and so come to the Father and ask to be taken into His family, taken into His kingdom, on the basis of what Jesus has done. Oh yes, coming to God has got to be on the basis of who Jesus is and what he has done. If we minimize either of these two things he fails to be the door and there is no way in. It is only as we accept Jesus as the Son of God sent as a Saviour to save me, that he becomes the door for me. When I accept him as this, he becomes the way in for me.

Jn 10:11 "I am the good shepherd. The good shepherd lays down his life for the sheep.

Most of us today don't live in the countryside and so pictures of shepherds with sheep only come to us from the pages of a book or from a TV documentary. But perhaps you have seen such pictures of a man rounding up the flock, shepherding them into a sheepfold for checking over. The sheepfold was the place of protection and security and the field was the place of feeding, and so they needed both places and it was the job of the shepherd to move them between the two.

In Israel 's history, shepherds were also used to refer to those who led Israel , as the people said to David before they made him king: “And the LORD said to you, `You will shepherd my people Israel , and you will become their ruler.” (2 Sam 5:2) In that he and those who followed him were only acting as representatives of the One who was referred to as The Shepherd of Israel (Gen 48:15, 49:24, Psa 80:1). Tragically these leaders so often got a bad name and did not look after the people and so the prophetic word came against them as we noted in a recent meditation: “because my shepherds did not search for my flock but cared for themselves rather than for my flock, therefore, O shepherds, hear the word of the LORD” (Ezek 34:8,9). There follows a beautiful word from the Lord: “For this is what the Sovereign LORD says: I myself will search for my sheep and look after them. As a shepherd looks after his scattered flock when he is with them, so will I look after my sheep. I will rescue them from all the places where they were scattered on a day of clouds and darkness. I will bring them out from the nations and gather them from the countries, and I will bring them into their own land. I will pasture them on the mountains of Israel, in the ravines and in all the settlements in the land. I will tend them in a good pasture, and the mountain heights of Israel will be their grazing land. There they will lie down in good grazing land, and there they will feed in a rich pasture on the mountains of Israel. I myself will tend my sheep and have them lie down, declares the Sovereign LORD. I will search for the lost and bring back the strays. I will bind up the injured and strengthen the weak, but the sleek and the strong I will destroy. I will shepherd the flock with justice.” (Ezek 34:11-16)

What an incredible number of declarations of care for the people of God. Then the Lord says, “I will place over them one shepherd, my servant David, and he will tend them; he will tend them and be their shepherd.” (Ezek 34:23) – the promise of a Messiah. Now we've quoted such a large piece of that prophecy (and there are more promises of good in the following prophecy which you ought to read sometime!) because it so reveals the goodness of God and the goodness of His intentions towards His people, in stark contrast to the self-centred carelessness of the leaders of Israel who had not cared for or blessed the people. They had been bad shepherds but God and his representative were good shepherds. Thus when Jesus now says he is the “good shepherd” he is clearly identifying himself with this messianic ‘David' figure that God had spoken about.

Everything Jesus did was for the good of people. Nothing he did was for himself. When the people came to him, “he had compassion on them, because they were like sheep without a shepherd” (Mk 6:34) and he blessed them with teaching (v.34) and with provision (v.35-44). Jesus was collecting a flock which would follow him beyond the end of the word, and to do that he would even give his own life.

Jn 10:30 I and the Father are one

The thing about John's Gospel is that things keep on cropping up again and again. This idea of the unity of the Father and the Son is one of those things. We've touched on it before in previous meditations, but when John keeps on raising it, it means he wants us to take on board something that the previous Gospels hadn't really picked up on. The fact of Jesus being God's Son was clearly something John felt the previous Gospels hadn't emphasized and so in a whole variety of ways John keeps on remembering things that had happened, things that had been said, which the others hadn't realized were significant.

Our verse today is strange in that it almost doesn't ‘fit' in the context of the verses that go before it. It seems to be a different time from that previously recounted, because we find Jesus was walking in the Temple precincts at the Feast of Dedication (v.22), and the Jews (presumably meaning the local religious Jews of Jerusalem) badgered him to tell them if he were the Christ (v.24). Jesus' answer was that he had, by the miracles he did, but they wouldn't believe him because they weren't, in fact, his sheep (v.25,26). Then, speaking of his sheep, he says that he gives them eternal life and so they will be completely safe and no one will be able to take them from him (v.29). It is then that he says his Father is greater than all, the implication being that because God is all-powerful no one will be able to take Jesus' followers from him.

Now the fact of the Feast may have bearing on what he is saying because it was a remembrance of the dedication of the Temple in AD 165 after it had been desecrated by Antiochus Epiphanes. That created a very unstable, uncertain, insecure sense for the Jews and so remembrance of that time was remembrance of a time when the security of the religious Jews was uncertain. It may be, therefore, that Jesus is saying, you religious Jews who rely on the Temple may be uncertain of your security, but my followers can be completely secure because they have the direct protection of my Father in heaven who is more powerful than any human despotic revolutionary. In this, Jesus has turned the conversation right round to emphasise the greatness of the power of God. The focus in the conversation is on God.

It is at that point that Jesus drops his bombshell: I and the Father are one. There can be no other explanation than to say that Jesus is identifying himself as fully as is possible with God, not just in his thinking or his purpose or his work, but in his very essence. He is saying the Father and I are completely one being. Now John doesn't give us any room for doubt here because we find: “Again the Jews picked up stones to stone him.” (v.31) and if you wonder why, they tell us, that it wasn't for the miracles that he did but, “ We are not stoning you for any of these,' replied the Jews, ‘but for blasphemy, because you, a mere man, claim to be God.'” (v.33).

There it is, right out in the open! The Jews say it: you are claiming to be God! In reply Jesus said to them, “Do not believe me unless I do what my Father does. But if I do it, even though you do not believe me, believe the miracles, that you may know and understand that the Father is in me, and I in the Father.” (v.37,38). He's not trying to hedge what he's said, he's actually confirming it by basically saying, “Yes, OK, but if you struggle to cope with me, look at the miracles and you'll realize these have got to be God at work through me – He's in me and I'm in Him.” That is the claim of Jesus Christ. Don't ever water it down!

Jn 11:25,26 Jesus said to her, "I am the resurrection and the life. He who believes in me will live, even though he dies; and whoever lives and believes in me will never die

Theory and reality often clash. We think one thing but then reality shows us that our thinking was wrong. Being around Jesus it must have constantly been like that! I have met those who have come back from parts of the world where God is doing staggering miracles of healing and one person said, “For the first three days I was in shock. My mind could not cope with what my eyes were seeing.” When you were around Jesus, it must have been the same. He kept on doing things that seemed to be quite impossible, and so perhaps we should not be hard on people who struggled to cope with what he said and did! Mary and Martha are in this group.

Busy Martha (see Lk 10:40 ) was the first of the two to come to Jesus when he had come to console them on the death of their brother (or at least that was how they saw it). Martha is in faith for Jesus to heal the sick: “ ‘Lord,' Martha said to Jesus, ‘if you had been here, my brother would not have died.'” (v.21). She knows Jesus has a healing ministry. Jesus nudges her: “Jesus said to her, ‘Your brother will rise again.'” (v.23). How will she cope with this? “Martha answered, ‘I know he will rise again in the resurrection at the last day.'” (v.24). Yes, she is a well taught Jew. She knows at the end of time, when Jesus returns, Lazarus will be raised to a new resurrection body. Yes, she can cope with that - but that's all. That's when Jesus makes the statement above.

Let's leave the first bit for a moment, let's take the easy bits first. (If you're not sure what a passage means, start with the easy bits first!). He who believes in me will live. On its own that can mean when you believe in Jesus you will receive life, but Jesus adds a rider: even though he dies. Now there can be no question that Jesus means physical death, so it obviously means if you believe in Jesus you will go on living even though you die physically, i.e. physical death actually isn't the end. But Jesus pushes it further: and whoever lives and believes in me will never die. This simply doubles up the first phrase. You may appear to die because your body lies down, but you will in fact simply carry on into eternity. So Jesus brings the possibility of eternal life. Let's now take the hard bit.

I am the resurrection and the life. This is another of those “I Am” sayings that associate Jesus with God. Every time he is saying “I am” he is implying, “I am the Eternal One” because, you may remember, that is what “I Am” implied when God said it to Moses. Now if Jesus is saying I am eternal he is saying that his life has a quality about it that can never be extinguished. The physical body was going to be stopped on the Cross, but the real Jesus will always exist – because he is God. That is his staggering claim; he cannot be extinguished. Everyone and every thing else can be, but not him – because he is God. Do you get that, because it is vitally important here? Very well, because he is The life that is eternal, he can impart that life to whoever he chooses and whereas they would normally die, because they have his indestructible life within them, they will be resurrected and the life that they then continue living, will be a life empowered by his eternal, indestructible life. Thus he (his life) is the resurrection and the (ongoing) life. It is his life linked with ours that ensures our eternal life. To prove he has the power to do this, he raises Lazarus from the dead – now Martha, not at the end of time!