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Series Code: IIWSS
Program Code: IIWSS024041S
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00:11 [uplifting music] 00:13 >>Eric Flickinger: Welcome to "Sabbath School," 00:15 brought to you by It Is Written. 00:16 We're glad that you are joining us again this week 00:19 for lesson number 2 in our study 00:21 in the themes of the book of John. 00:24 We're going to be looking today at signs of Jesus' divinity. 00:28 Let's begin with prayer. 00:30 Father, we wanna thank You for bringing us together today. 00:34 We ask that You will bless us and help us to understand 00:36 more clearly the themes in the book of John 00:39 and the wonderful lessons that You have for us to learn. 00:43 We thank You, in Jesus' name, amen. 00:45 >>Thomas Shepherd: Amen. 00:46 >>Eric: Well, we're grateful to have with us once again 00:48 one of the authors of this quarter's lesson, 00:51 and that is Dr. Tom Shepherd. 00:53 He's the senior research professor of New Testament 00:55 at the Theological Seminary, Andrews University. 00:58 Tom, thanks for joining us again. 00:59 >>Tom: Good to be with you. 01:01 >>Eric: So last week, we took a look at some of the signs 01:03 that kind of pointed the way of Jesus' ministry. 01:06 We went through three of them last week. 01:09 And we're going to look at some of the signs 01:10 of His divinity this week. 01:12 Let's jump to John, chapter 6, if we can. 01:16 In John, chapter 6 we find that Jesus tests Philip, 01:21 and we see how Andrew responds to this. 01:25 What lessons are we learning here in John, chapter 6? 01:29 >>Tom: All right, so let's turn to John 6, 01:32 and we want to read verses 4 through 9. 01:38 >>Eric: "Now the Passover, a feast of the Jews, was near. 01:41 "Then Jesus lifted up His eyes, and seeing a great multitude 01:44 "coming toward Him, He said to Philip, 01:46 "'Where shall we buy bread, that these may eat?' 01:48 "But this He said to test him, 01:50 "for He Himself knew what He would do. 01:53 "Philip answered Him, 01:54 "'Two hundred denarii worth of bread 01:56 "'is not sufficient for them, that every one of them 01:58 "may have a little.' 01:59 "One of His disciples, Andrew, Simon Peter's brother, 02:02 "said to Him, 'There is a lad here who has five barley loaves 02:06 and two small fish, but what are they among so many?'" 02:10 >>Tom: [laughing] Well, it's an interesting story. 02:12 First of all, we notice that this is-- 02:14 there's a reference here to the Passover feast. 02:17 This story is going to be the story 02:19 of the feeding of the 5,000. 02:21 Actually, it's one of the few stories 02:22 that appears in all four gospels. 02:24 And John has mostly other stories of Jesus 02:28 that the other gospels don't have. 02:29 But this is one of the stories that he has 02:31 that all the other gospels have as well. 02:34 It's near the Passover feast of the Jews, which, of course, 02:38 was the great memorial of their coming out of the land of Egypt 02:42 and being saved from Egyptian bondage. 02:46 So He lifts up His eyes, He sees this large crowd, 02:49 and He asks Philip, "Where are we going to buy bread 02:51 so that all these people can eat?" 02:53 Now, you can just imagine-- I can imagine somebody 02:58 being at a potluck at a church, and the pastor comes down, 03:04 the people are preparing the meal down in the kitchen 03:09 or something, and he says, 03:10 "My friends, we've just had a hundred people, extra people, 03:15 "come from, you know, an academy, these young people, 03:19 "who can eat a lot of food, 03:20 and we need to prepare food for them as well." 03:23 I can imagine some of the people 03:25 would be tearing out their hair--"Where are we going 03:28 to get food for all of these young people to eat?" 03:31 So Jesus' question is interesting because 03:35 it puts Philip to the test. 03:39 What will he say? 03:41 What will be his response? 03:43 How will he deal with the problem 03:46 that Jesus has set before him? 03:48 Will he turn back to Jesus the problem, 03:50 or will he look for a different solution? 03:53 Well, Philip kind of fails the test here at this point. 03:56 He thinks of, you know, their resources. 04:01 He's like, "Two hundred denarii"-- 04:03 well, maybe that's how much money they had 04:06 in their little bag bank, you know. 04:07 "Two hundred denarii worth of bread would not be enough" 04:10 for each of them to just get a little bit, right? 04:13 So this is a lot of people. 04:15 There's 5,000 men and then women and children, 04:17 you know, there's gonna be 10,000 or more people. 04:20 And so it was a lot of people. 04:23 Now, Andrew, Simon Peter's brother, 04:26 one of the first disciples, 04:27 pipes up and says to Him, "There's a boy here who has 04:30 five barley loaves and two fish, but what are they for so many?" 04:34 What indeed. [laughs] 04:36 But Andrew's expression is a little bit more, you know, 04:40 "Well, Jesus, what will You do with that," you know? 04:43 It's kind of like the lesson, "Well, bring your loaves 04:45 to Jesus and let Him use what you have." 04:50 You know, it's actually, I think, a great lesson 04:52 for our churches, is bring to Jesus what you have. 04:55 If you've got a small church, and I'm a pastor, 04:57 one of my churches is a small church, 05:00 and you can say, what do we have? 05:02 What can we...? You know, you have something. 05:05 Bring what you have to Jesus, ask Him to bless it, 05:09 use it to bless and encourage other people, 05:11 and watch what God will do. 05:13 And of course, that's what happens in this story. 05:15 >>Eric: Yeah. So in this story, 05:18 what were the people in this story looking for? 05:21 What were they hoping for? 05:23 And was Jesus' response or what Jesus did, was that-- 05:27 did it match what they were hoping for or expecting? 05:30 >>Tom: Yeah, well, this miracle of the feeding 05:33 of the 5,000 really impressed a lot of people. 05:36 And, you know, they had thousands of people there, 05:40 and they were ready to make Him king. 05:42 In fact, John tells us that, that they're-- 05:44 if you look down at verse 15, it says, 05:46 "Perceiving then that they were about to come 05:49 "and take Him by force to make Him king, 05:52 Jesus withdrew again to the mountain by Himself." 05:55 So he sends the disciples away. 05:58 He sends the people away. 05:59 And He goes up on the mountain all by Himself. 06:03 Now, we find out what they're looking for. 06:05 The next day, He's going to walk on the water 06:09 to reach His disciples, 06:11 but the people come looking for Him at Capernaum. 06:14 And if we read verses 26 and 27, 06:18 we'll see what their expectation was. 06:22 >>Eric: "Jesus answered them and said, 'Most assuredly, 06:25 "'I say to you, you seek me, not because you saw the signs, 06:29 "'but because you ate of the loaves and were filled. 06:32 "'Do not labor for the food which perishes, but for the food 06:35 "'which endures to everlasting life, which the Son of Man will 06:39 give you, because God the Father has set His seal on Him.'" 06:42 >>Tom: So He says, "The reason you came 06:44 looking for me is because you got a nice meal." 06:49 It's sometimes what you call "rice Christians," 06:52 where you give them food 06:54 and they become Christians because you gave them something, 06:57 you know, you gave them material resources. 07:00 Now, this is not to say that when you become a Christian, 07:02 there's no benefits for being a Christian. Of course there is. 07:06 There's a fellowship of believers, 07:08 and there's the peace of your heart, in your heart, 07:11 the forgiveness of your sins, and the opportunity 07:13 to be part of something bigger than yourself. 07:15 And yes, many friends and, you know, great experiences 07:20 and great preaching and a stable life. 07:23 There's a whole lot of good things in the Christian life. 07:26 But if all you're in it for is the material benefits, 07:31 you're going to be disappointed. 07:33 And that's what basically Jesus says to them. 07:36 He says, "Don't seek that. 07:37 "Seek the bread that endures to eternal life, 07:42 which the Son of Man will give to you." 07:45 We'll see more of this as He unpacks this idea 07:48 of the bread of life and who He is in John 6. 07:52 But John 6 is one of the important passages 07:56 about His signs of doing this wonderful miracle. 08:00 And it's actually one of the turning points 08:02 in the Gospel of John. 08:03 >>Eric: Let's jump now to John 9. 08:06 In John, chapter 9 there's another interesting story here. 08:10 Connect for us sin and sickness. 08:15 How do these concepts, these ideas go together? 08:18 How should they go together in our understanding? 08:20 >>Tom: Sure, let's read John 9, verses 1 through 7. 08:26 >>Eric: "Now as Jesus passed by, 08:28 "He saw a man who was blind from birth. 08:30 "And His disciples asked Him, saying, 'Rabbi, who sinned, 08:34 "this man or his parents, that he was born blind?' 08:37 "Jesus answered, 'Neither this man nor his parents sinned, 08:41 "'but that the works of God should be revealed in him. 08:45 "'I must work the works of Him who sent me while it is day; 08:48 "'the night is coming when no one can work. 08:50 "As long as I am in the world, I am the light of the world.' 08:54 "When He had said these things, 08:55 "He spat on the ground and made clay with [His] saliva; 08:58 "and He anointed the eyes of the blind man with the clay. 09:02 "And He said to him, 'Go, wash in the pool of Siloam' 09:05 "(which is translated, Sent). 09:07 So he went and washed, and came back seeing." 09:10 >>Tom: That's the expression of the miracle, right? 09:12 That Jesus heals this man so that he can see. 09:15 The whole rest of the chapter is all the reaction of people 09:18 to this amazing miracle. 09:21 Jesus says, "As long as I am in the world, 09:25 I am the light of the world." 09:27 And then He makes this mud and anoints the guy's eyes. 09:31 We're like, "Oh, and He put mud on his eyes." 09:33 But one commentator said that the man didn't have--you know, 09:38 when God originally made human beings, He made them 09:40 from the dust of the ground, breathed into the nostril 09:43 "the breath of life, and he became a living person," 09:45 or "a living soul." 09:47 Here's what was missing. 09:49 Now Jesus takes and makes some mud and gives him his eyes 09:53 so that he can see. So it's really quite a story. 09:57 But it starts with the disciples asking a question: 10:01 "Who sinned, this man or his parents, 10:05 that he was born blind?" Now, you kind of wonder 10:07 how it could be him if he was born blind. 10:10 He hadn't done anything wrong before he was born. 10:13 But that's the question they ask, and Jesus says 10:17 it was not that this man sinned or his parents 10:20 "but that the works of God" might be displayed in him. 10:23 Now, some people when a person gets sick, there will be people, 10:30 they seem to come out of the woodwork, who will say to them, 10:34 "Well, you must have been doing something wrong, 10:37 "and that's why you got sick. 10:38 "You weren't eating the right diet, you know, or you did this, 10:42 "you know, or something else that you were not following 10:44 the right kind of principles, and that's why you're sick." 10:48 Thank you very much, Job's friends. 10:52 But Jesus here indicates that when you get sick, 10:55 it's not always because you've done something wrong. 10:58 That's an important point. 11:00 Sickness is part of living in a world of sin, and sometimes 11:06 sickness comes upon us not for anything we did wrong, 11:09 but just from the weight of sin of 6,000 years of our world. 11:14 Now, if you turn back to John-- we looked at this before-- 11:16 John, chapter 5, 11:18 we turn back to John, chapter 5, verse 14. 11:21 This is the words of Jesus to the man who had been paralyzed 11:25 for all those years at the pool of Bethesda, 38 years paralyzed. 11:31 So, read John 5:14. 11:33 >>Eric: "Afterward Jesus found him in the temple, 11:36 "and said to him, 'See, you have been made well. 11:38 Sin no more, lest a worse thing come upon you.'" 11:41 >>Tom: All right, so it seems that that guy got paralyzed 11:46 because he did something wrong. 11:48 He did some sinful behavior and became paralyzed. 11:51 So Jesus does not disconnect sin and suffering, 11:55 but He says it's not always your own suffering 11:59 that's involved here that brings on the sickness. 12:03 And that's an important issue to remember. 12:05 >>Eric: We want to come back in a moment and dig just 12:09 a little bit more deeply into this story, but before we do, 12:11 we're going to take a quick break. 12:14 If somebody wants to dig into this more, 12:17 we have a companion book to this quarter's study. 12:20 Share a little bit about that. 12:21 >>Tom: That's right. So each quarter, 12:23 a companion--some author, sometimes it's the author 12:26 of the lesson, sometimes it's somebody else, 12:28 is asked to write a companion book 12:30 that gives you additional information. 12:32 So it's helpful for people who are in the Sabbath school class, 12:35 it's helpful for teachers and pastors, 12:37 to know more about the topic that's being studied, 12:40 and we have each of those. 12:41 Each quarter, we have one of those, 12:42 and there will be one for this-- also for this, there is one 12:45 of those quarterly--one of those books for this quarter as well. 12:48 >>Eric: That's right. And if you'd like to pick that up, 12:50 you can do so at itiswritten.shop. 12:54 Again, that's itiswritten.shop. 12:56 You're looking for the companion book to 12:58 this quarter's "Sabbath School" lesson, "Themes in John." 13:02 We're going to come back as we continue taking a look 13:04 at some of these signs of Jesus' divinity 13:08 here in lesson number 2. We'll be right back. 13:11 [uplifting music] 13:15 >>John Bradshaw: Miracles, events that can only 13:17 be explained as the actions of an all-powerful God. 13:21 If you look at the Bible, you'll find it's full of miracles: 13:26 parting the Red Sea, healing the blind, 13:30 walking on water, raising the dead. 13:34 Many have claimed these events never happened. 13:37 But did they? 13:39 Is it important for Christians to believe in miracles? 13:43 And do they still happen today? 13:45 Join me for "Do You Believe in Miracles?" 13:48 We'll meet some remarkable people 13:50 and hear some incredible stories. 13:51 We'll learn what miracles are and what they're not, 13:55 and we'll discuss the greatest miracle of all time, 13:59 one that has significance for every human being on earth 14:03 and the potential to change your life entirely. 14:06 "Do You Believe in Miracles?" 14:09 Brought to you by It Is Written TV. 14:16 >>Male announcer: Loving well is a way of life. 14:19 And loving well means wanting the very best for others. 14:23 "Go ye therefore" becomes "I'll go, send me." 14:28 Send me across the world or across town. 14:33 Work in me to impact lives for such a time as this. 14:37 And if I can't go myself, I want to send others 14:40 who can take the everlasting gospel to the world. 14:44 It Is Written's Office of Planned Giving gives you 14:47 the opportunity to leave a legacy, 14:50 to make a major impact for Christ, 14:54 to lead others to faith in Jesus in preparation for eternity. 14:59 Let God use you to enable others to go. 15:03 To learn more, visit HisLegacy.com. 15:06 That's HisLegacy.com. 15:16 >>John: More and more people are watching It Is Written TV. 15:20 They're watching their favorite "It Is Written" programs, 15:22 listening to inspiring sermon series, and much more. 15:27 They're watching them here, here, and even here. 15:31 See for yourself why people are turning to It Is Written TV to 15:35 watch their favorite Christian programs live and on demand. 15:39 Watch It Is Written TV for free anytime on Roku, Apple TV, 15:43 and at itiswritten.tv. 15:46 [uplifting music] 15:50 >>Eric: Welcome back to "Sabbath School," 15:52 brought to you by It Is Written. 15:53 We're taking a look at the book of John, 15:56 delving into the great themes in the book of John. 15:59 And right now, we are taking a look at some of the signs 16:01 of Jesus' divinity. 16:03 We're in John, chapter 9 right now, and we were just looking 16:06 a moment ago at the man whose blindness was healed. 16:10 I want to stay in John 9 for just a moment. 16:12 The blind man had a-- or the formerly blind man-- 16:16 had an interaction with some of the religious leaders. 16:20 What did that look like? 16:21 >>Tom: It's one of the funniest stories in the book. 16:25 This blind man, who was a beggar, 16:26 and, you know, not probably-- 16:30 well, not very, you know, well educated or anything-- 16:34 it doesn't say he's a beggar maybe, but he's blind, 16:36 probably a beggar. And he is 16:40 healed on the Sabbath, and so they bring him 16:42 to the Pharisees, and there's a whole back and forth 16:46 where they don't--they question what happened to him. 16:50 And he keeps on telling what it was that occurred. 16:56 So they said to him, you know, "What is it?" 16:59 If you look at verse 16 of chapter 9: 17:01 "Some of the Pharisees said, 'This man'"-- 17:03 talking about Jesus-- "'This man is not from God, 17:05 "for He does not keep the Sabbath.' 17:07 But others said, 'How can a man who is a sinner do such signs?'" 17:10 There's that word "signs" again. 17:12 "And there was a division among them. 17:14 "So they [again said] to the blind man, 17:17 "'What do you say about Him, since He has opened your eyes?' 17:18 He said, 'He is a prophet.'" 17:20 Then they say they don't think that he was born blind. 17:23 So they call his parents, and they bring his parents, 17:27 and they say, "[This is] your son, 17:30 [whom] you say was born blind? How...does he now see?" 17:33 And, you know, they're trying to deny the miracle 17:35 of what Jesus has done. 17:37 His parents say in verse 20, "We know that this is our son 17:40 and that he was born blind." 17:42 So, you know, they're talking about the facts. 17:45 "But how he now sees we do not know, 17:48 "nor do we know who opened his eyes. 17:51 "Ask him; he is of age. 17:52 He will speak for himself." 17:54 Because they were afraid they were going to be 17:55 thrown out of the synagogue. 17:57 So there's this interesting thing as the story progresses, 18:01 the man who was formerly blind knows more and more and more, 18:06 and the Pharisees seem to know less and less and less and less. 18:10 So there's kind of a crossover that happens as this goes on. 18:14 And so, "The second time," verse 24, they call this man, 18:19 the blind man; they say, "Give glory to God. 18:22 We know that this Man is a sinner." 18:24 Now, when they said, "Give glory to God," it's a judicial oath. 18:30 The same thing happens in the story of Joshua with Achan, 18:33 Joshua 7, verse 19. 18:36 When Achan is finally brought before Joshua, 18:38 Joshua says to him, "My son, give glory to God. 18:41 Tell me what you've done." 18:43 So it's like, "Put your hand on the Bible. 18:45 "Do you swear to tell the truth, the whole truth, 18:46 and nothing but the truth, so help you God?" 18:48 Give glory to God. 18:50 So they're saying, "Stop telling lies; start telling the truth." 18:53 And then they say, "We know that this Man is a sinner." 18:59 So "He answered, 'Whether He is a sinner I do not know. 19:03 One thing I do know, that though I was blind, now I see.'" 19:06 [laughs] So he's not gonna-- he's not gonna give in. 19:09 "They said to him, 'What did He do to you? 19:11 "How did He open your eyes?' 19:13 "He answered them, '[I've] told you already, 19:14 "'and you would not listen. 19:16 "'[Would] you want to hear it again? 19:17 Do you also want to become His disciples?'" 19:19 So this guy has a certain amount of "chutzpah," you know, 19:23 that he's not going to be, you know, bandied about. 19:27 He's not going to be overwhelmed by these religious leaders. 19:31 And, you know, he so much says, you know, 19:34 "Well, I'm becoming His disciple. How about you?" 19:38 And they're like, pffft!, "We're disciples of Moses, 19:41 but we don't even know where this guy came from." 19:44 And then he says, "Well, now that's amazing." 19:47 It's never-- this is in verse 30: 19:49 "Why, this is an amazing thing! 19:51 "You do not know where He comes from, and yet He opened my eyes. 19:55 "We know that God does not listen to sinners, but if anyone 19:58 "is a worshiper of God and does His will, God listens to him. 20:01 "Never since the world began has it...heard [of] anyone 20:04 "opened the eyes of a man born blind. 20:06 If this Man were not from God, He could do nothing." 20:09 And I can just see the jaws of these doctors of the law 20:14 just drop as this guy's impeccable, you know, argument 20:19 and logic just cuts right through 20:21 all of the phony baloney that's being put out there 20:24 and, you know, indicates that Jesus had to be from God. 20:28 And they so much as-- 20:32 you can see them kind of taking their robes 20:34 and wrapping them around them, and they say in verse 34, 20:37 "'You were born in utter sin, and would you teach us?' 20:39 And they cast him out." 20:41 At the very beginning of this story it said, "Who sinned, 20:46 this man or his parents, that he was born blind?" 20:49 Jesus said, neither one. 20:51 At the end of the story, they say, 20:54 "'You were born in utter sin, and would you teach us?' 20:58 And they cast him out." 20:59 They won't listen to him because of their prejudice of that, 21:04 you know, they think he's a sinner, he's born in sin; 21:07 they don't have to listen to him. 21:08 That's a dangerous thing. 21:10 It's dangerous to say, "I don't need to listen to that person" 21:13 because of such and such and such and such. 21:16 Sometimes, the people who have the hardest things 21:20 to say to us are exactly the things that we need to hear. 21:24 So he confounds these religious leaders, 21:26 and he's just a blind beggar, you know. 21:30 So it's really a funny story, and I appreciate it a lot. 21:33 Well, we'll probably come back to the story again because 21:35 it has some more themes about it that later come into our study. 21:39 >>Eric: So looking at the signs of Jesus' divinity, 21:41 we've seen how He fed the 5,000. 21:44 We saw Him heal this man who was born blind. 21:47 We come over to John 11, 21:49 and in John 11 we find the raising of Lazarus. 21:53 When Jesus is called to go to Bethany, 21:59 He doesn't go immediately. >>Tom: No. 22:01 >>Eric: Why doesn't He go immediately? 22:03 >>Tom: That's a good question. 22:04 That's what the sisters asked. [chuckles] 22:06 So if you read John 11 and verse 5, it says, 22:12 "Now Jesus loved Martha and her sister and Lazarus. 22:17 "So, when He heard that Lazarus was ill, 22:19 He stayed two days longer in the place where He was." 22:23 That's so inexplicable. 22:25 Why would He stay away? 22:29 And the answer to that is to see the glory of God 22:33 because He's going to raise him from the dead. 22:36 But, of course, the sisters didn't know that. 22:39 You know, they didn't see that. 22:42 And he had actually said in verse 4, "When Jesus heard" that 22:45 he was sick, "He said, 'This illness does not lead to death. 22:49 "'It is for the glory of God, 22:51 so that the Son of God may be glorified through it.'" 22:53 This is really, like, one of the greatest signs, 22:56 if not the greatest sign, that Jesus does in the book of John 22:59 is the raising of Lazarus from the dead. 23:02 And you think about that, I mean, a little later, 23:04 Jesus is going to be at a feast, and Lazarus, 23:07 the man He raises from the dead, is at the feast with Him. 23:10 You know, like, this guy was in the grave, and now 23:14 here he is sitting, eating a meal with us, you know? 23:16 It's just--it's just an amazing story. 23:19 But when He comes to where they are, you read it in verse-- 23:26 starting in verse 17. 23:28 Let's read verses 17 through 21. 23:34 >>Eric: "So when Jesus came, He found that 23:36 "he had already been in the tomb four days. 23:39 "Now Bethany was near Jerusalem, about two miles away. 23:42 "And many of the Jews had joined the women around Martha 23:45 "and Mary, to comfort them concerning their brother. 23:48 "Then Martha, as soon as she heard that Jesus was coming, 23:51 "went and met Him, but Mary was sitting in the house. 23:54 "Now Martha said to Jesus, 'Lord, if You had been here, 23:57 my brother would not have died.'" 23:59 >>Tom: Yeah, now when Mary comes to see Him, 24:02 she says almost exactly the same words: 24:05 "Lord, if You had been here, my brother would not have died." 24:08 That's what they both say. 24:09 You know, probably they'd been saying this over and over again 24:14 when He hadn't arrived. 24:18 So when you go down to verse 33, after He meets Mary-- 24:22 she actually, in verse 32, it says, "When Mary came to 24:26 "where Jesus was and saw Him, she fell at His feet, 24:29 "saying to Him, 'Lord, 24:31 "if You had been here, my brother would not have died.'" 24:33 It's very touching, you know. 24:35 Verse 33: "When Jesus saw her weeping, 24:38 "and the Jews who had come with her also weeping, 24:41 "He was deeply moved in His spirit and greatly troubled. 24:44 "And He said, 'Where have you laid him?' 24:46 "They said to Him, 'Lord, come and see.' 24:48 "Jesus wept. So the Jews said, 'See how He loved him!' 24:53 "But some of them said, 'Could not He who opened 24:56 the eyes of the blind men also have kept this man from dying?'" 25:00 [chuckles] You know, it references back 25:02 to the blind man's story, right? 25:04 That He loved them so much-- 25:07 so Jesus weeping, why would Jesus weep? 25:11 He was about to raise Lazarus from the dead. 25:14 Ellen White explains this, and she says that Jesus was weeping 25:18 because for the people who wouldn't believe because He knew 25:22 what He was about to do, but He's crying that 25:25 there are hard hearts that would not listen, 25:29 would not turn to Him, 25:31 and so He's gonna go to where they are. 25:36 "Lord, come and see." All right, 25:38 and so He's gonna do that. 25:40 Now, when He goes to the place, of course, 25:43 He tells them to remove the stone. 25:45 And Martha objects. 25:47 And Jesus responds to her, "Did I not tell you"-- 25:50 this is verse 40--"'Did I not tell you that if you believed 25:53 "you would see the glory of God?' 25:55 So they [take] away the stone." 25:57 And He prays this amazing prayer: 25:59 "Father, I thank You that You have heard me." 26:02 Lazarus is still in the tomb, 26:04 you know, still dead, still stinking, and He says, 26:07 "Father, I thank You that You have heard me." 26:09 And then He cries out 26:11 at the end of His prayer, "Lazarus, come out." 26:13 And the man comes out bound, hand and foot. 26:17 He says, "Let him go." 26:19 And then we read in verses-- 26:22 we should read verses 45 through 53. 26:26 This is an important point in the book. 26:28 We've got to do this quick. 26:30 >>Eric: "Then many of the Jews who had come to Mary, 26:32 "and had seen the things Jesus did, believed in Him. 26:35 "But some of them went away to the Pharisees 26:37 "and told them the things Jesus did. 26:39 "Then the chief priests and the Pharisees gathered a council 26:42 "and said, 'What shall we do? 26:44 "'For this Man works many signs. 26:45 "'If we let Him alone like this, everyone will believe in Him, 26:48 "'and the Romans will come and take away 26:50 "both our place and nation.' 26:52 "And one of them, Caiaphas, being high priest that year, 26:55 "said to them, 'You know nothing at all, nor do you consider 26:58 "'that it is expedient for us that one man should die 27:01 "for the people, and not that the whole nation should perish.' 27:04 "Now this he did not say on his own authority, 27:06 "but being high priest that year 27:07 "he prophesied that Jesus would die for the nation, 27:10 "and not for that nation only, but also that He would gather 27:13 "together in one the children of God who were scattered abroad. 27:16 Then, from that day on, they plotted to put Him to death." 27:20 >>Tom: All right, so here they are. 27:22 They see the amazing signs, 27:24 and yet they plan to put Him to death. 27:27 We'll have to study some more of this in further lessons. 27:29 >>Eric: Just incredible stories, incredible themes 27:31 that we are delving into in the book of John. 27:34 And we are glad that you are joining us. 27:36 We're going to pick this up again next week as 27:39 we delve into lesson number 3, "The Backstory: The Prologue." 27:44 We look forward to seeing you again next time 27:46 on "Sabbath School," 27:47 brought to you by It Is Written. 27:50 [uplifting music] 28:24 [uplifting music] 28:26 [Captions provided by Aberdeen Captioning www.abercap.com] |
Revised 2024-10-03