Incorrigible and Irredeemable

1 Corinthians 10:1-13               John 8:30-47

Incorrigible and Irredeemable

One of the most frustrating and exasperating things in life is attempting to reason with someone who will not listen and who refuses to understand. Sometimes you can actually see the moment they realise the flaw in their argument and then they either get louder (as if shouting will make a difference), or they get angry (and this can sometimes manifest itself in tears), or they shift and deny that they said what they said earlier, or they simply turn around and storm off in a huff – preferably banging a door or two on the way out. Be honest, I’ve just described you at some or other point in your life…

When my mother found herself in a place where she could no longer defend her argument, she would simply toss her head and say, “A woman convinced against her will is of the same opinion still.” And you wonder why I no longer have any hair left. But the bottom line is that people only listen when they are predisposed to do so. Like in our Gospel passage for today, we see that only those who have ears to hear do, in fact, hear. 

We are told in verse 30 that as Jesus debated with the leaders in the Temple, some folks believed in him. But what follows shows that this did not mean that their faith was based on truth. You see, it is not the initial agreement with the Lord’s words that makes one a follower of the light…no, rather it is the consistent and persistent walking in the light that proves the reality of our faith. “If you hold to my Word (teaching),” Jesus said to those who had believed in him, “you are really my followers (disciples). Then you will know the truth and the truth will set you free.” 

Jesus repeated this statement later in John as well. “If anyone loves me, he will obey my Word (teaching),” (John 14:23) or, stated negatively, “He who does not love me will not obey my Word (teaching).” (John 14:23). The wordplay here is brilliant. 

John had already told us that Jesus is the Word we must hold to, and he is the Truth we must know, and he is the one who has come to set us free – to deliver from slavery to sin (or darkness) those who follow him in the light. In a nutshell, Jesus was telling them and us that he embodies everything that made them and us the people of God. As we saw two weeks ago, by the time Jesus was born, the “light” of Israel had become little more than a memory remembered in the Festivals of Israel, recalled in psalms of lament, and rehearsed in stories of the past. At this time, Israel was ruled by a puppet king and wealthy aristocrats who were controlled and manipulated by a powerful pagan empire, the last in a line of several oppressors since their Exile in Babylon. 

As we saw earlier, this teaching of Jesus took place the day after the final day of the Feast of Tabernacles. During the Feast of Tabernacles, the Jews celebrated not only their miraculous deliverance from Egypt and their survival throughout the wilderness wanderings, but they also recalled both the time when Solomon’s Temple was dedicated to the Lord (1 Kings 8:2) as well as their return from Exile under the leadership of Joshua and Zerubbabel (Ezra 3). At the time of their return, as Ezra read the Word of God to them during the Feast of Tabernacles (Nehemiah 8), a great revival broke out as the returnees confessed and repented of their sins. 

As such, the Feast of Tabernacles served to remind the Israelites in every generation of their deliverance by God in the past and it also served as a reminder for them to look forward to the expected future deliverance by the coming Messiah.

But the cracks in the faith of those in the Temple began to show immediately as they responded with probably one of the most curious statements in the Gospels. “We are Abraham’s descendants,” they said. True enough, but then they added, “And we have never been slaves of anyone.” This statement borders on the delusional. What about their 400-year-long slavery under the Egyptians, the various periods of enslavement under different near eastern nations during the time of the Judges, their 70-year-long exile under the Babylonians, their servile vassal status under Persia, Greece, and at that present moment, Rome?

However, some commentators try to explain this otherwise ludicrous statement by referring to an ancient saying that confidently declared, “Circumcised men do not descend into Gehenna (hell).”  (see C. E. B. Cranfield, A Critical and Exegetical Commentary on the Epistle to the Romans (Edinburgh: T. & T. Clark Ltd., 1975), p. 172.) In other words, they believed that as their forefather Abraham was the eternal protector of all Jews, whether pious or sinful, they were subject to no one in a spiritual sense. They were basically claiming freedom and eternal security through covenantal inclusion, an Old Testament equivalent to a form of “once saved always saved”.

If this is what they were referring to, then Jesus' reply makes perfect sense. “I tell you the truth,” he said, “everyone who sins is a slave to sin.” The Scriptures are clear on the subject of bondage to sin…there is none that does good, no not one…we were all conceived and brought forth in iniquity…our heart is deceitful and desperately wicked, and so on. This is what Jesus meant when using the word “slavery”. But the freedom Jesus was speaking about is not just freedom from sin or the effects of sin, but also freedom to obedience. To have the light of life, there must be a following and a walking in the light. It involves holding to the Word and abiding in the Truth. In other words, it is not enough for you to begin well. You must persevere and end well too. 

As Paul said to the Corinthians regarding Israel: “I do not want you to be unaware, brothers, that our forefathers were all under the cloud, and that they all passed through the sea. They were all baptized into Moses in the cloud and in the sea. They all ate the same spiritual food and drank the same spiritual drink; for they all drank from the spiritual rock that accompanied them, and that rock was Christ.” 

We could say they were all members of the covenant community delivered or saved by God from slavery in Egypt, right?

“Nevertheless,” Paul continued, “God was not pleased with most of them, for they were struck down in the wilderness…Now.” Paul concluded, “these things happened to them as examples and were written down as warnings for us, on whom the fulfilment of the ages has come. So, the one who thinks he is standing firm should be careful not to fall.” (1 Corinthians 10:1-5, 11-12 Berean) 

Heritage counts for nothing when you are enslaved to sin.

For this reason, after having defined the kind of slavery he was speaking about, he picked up on the language of familial or covenant legacy. While it was possible for slaves to inherit upon the death of their master (such as the case of Eleazar and Abraham in Genesis 15:2-3), it was not considered normal practice, nor was it enshrined in the law. Inheritance, which would include the father’s slaves (Lev. 25:39–40), always went to the sons (chiefly the oldest son), or in some rare cases, to the daughters like with the daughters of Zelophehad (Numbers 27:1-11). So, following Jesus’ argument, if everyone was enslaved to sin, then no one could be free. Only the Son, who (in the case of Jesus) had no sin and was, therefore, not enslaved by sin, would have the power to release his inherited slaves…those given to him by his Father.

Now, it is possible that Jesus may have been alluding to the story of Abraham, Ishmael, and Isaac. Ishmael, the son of the Egyptian slave Hagar, was not the son of the promise and was therefore not to be an heir with Isaac (cf. also Paul’s argument in Galatians 4:28-31). Be that as it may, the bottom-line is that the slave could not partake of the inheritance…only a legitimate son had such privileges. So, as the sinless Son of God, Jesus has the power and the authority to set free all who are enslaved to sin. “He whom the Son sets free,” Jesus said, “shall be free indeed.” A freedom far greater than that of the Exodus. 

Now while Jesus did not dispute their physical heritage as Abraham’s descendants, he did dispute their spiritual heritage. “If you were Abraham’s children,” he said, “you would do the works of Abraham.” In other words, their behaviour blatantly contradicted their claimed status. 

Abraham’s life was characterised by faith in God’s word as well as obedience to God’s word. Whatever God said, he believed, and he did, without question or argument. As we’ve already seen, the leaders had already displaced God’s Word with their tradition. But this was nothing new. Throughout the Old Testament, we see how the people of God were constantly being led astray by wanting to be like the other nations around them…not unlike the modern revisionist church. 

Now from this point on, the discussion began to get nasty. That’s often what happens when folks find themselves in a corner. Attack and ridicule are used as a method of self-defence. “We are not illegitimate children,” they protested. Is it possible that this was a snide remark about the circumstances of Jesus’ birth? This was such a small tight-knit community and the scandal surrounding Mary’s pregnancy may not have stayed in Nazareth.

Be that as it may, their claim was that they were part of the theocracy…that they were legitimate members of the covenant community of God. “The only Father we have is God himself,” they said. But Jesus exploded this claim using the same argument as with their claim to being descendants of Abraham. 

“If God were your father, you would love me, for I am from God, and now I am here.” Now, if his detractors were, in fact, alluding to his birth in their remark about legitimacy, then here Jesus may have been defending his mother’s claim to virginity and the exceptional divine nature of his conception and incarnation. Nevertheless, Jesus clearly indicated here that his coming to earth was by his Father’s design and therefore they should have welcomed him. 

I believe that there’s an echo here of what John said in the opening chapter of his Gospel. “He (Jesus, the Light) came to his own and yet his own did not receive him. But to all who did receive him and who believed in his name, he (the Son) gave the right (the freedom) to become children of God – children born not of natural descent, nor of human decision or a husband's will, but born of God.” (John 1:11-13) 

Their inability to hear and their refusal to obey was because they were not children of Abraham nor of God…a sad reality revealed by their attitude and their behaviour. Their desire to accuse, sentence, and execute Jesus mirrored the actions of the devil. “He was a murderer from the beginning,” Jesus said, “not holding to the truth, for there is no truth in him.”

I believe the imagery here is that of the third chapter of Genesis. The first Adam brought death into the world because he believed the lies of Satan whose object was to activate the death penalty for sin through Adam and Eve’s rejection of God’s Word. So, there is a major contrast here. Satan is the originator of lies. Jesus is the embodiment of truth. Those who reject Jesus (the Word), reject the truth and embrace the lie…just like Adam and Eve.

  To clinch the matter in his favour, Jesus asked them two basic rhetorical questions, “Can you prove me guilty of sin? If I am telling the truth, why don’t you believe me?” If they thought he was not telling the truth, it ought to have been easy to convict him of lying. But, as we know, they eventually had to resort to hiring false witnesses to condemn him to death at a mockery of a trial…and even then, they could not agree but brought conflicting evidence against him because you can’t support lies with lies. 

As John later reported: even when the pagan governor asked them, “What charges are you bringing against this man?” they did not have a ready reply. They simply said, “If he were not a criminal, we would not have handed him over to you.” (John 18:29-30) Several times Pilate stated, “I find no basis for a charge against him.” And yet, those who knew the law are taught the law called for the lawless murder of an innocent law-abiding man. That is the power of the lies of the devil…all you need for a lie to succeed is an unprincipled mob and a few instigators and agitators.

The problem here is quite basic. Jesus spelled it out in verse 47. “He who belongs to God hears what God says. The reason you do not hear is that you do not belong to God.” It really is a shocking tragedy…the people of God did not know their God. 

You see it all boils down to whether we hold to His Word or not. 

After all, that was the first temptation, wasn’t it? “Did God really say?” In fact, I believe every temptation is a variation of this one…“did God really say”…and then add whatever sin is desired. 

“If you hold to my Word (teaching),” Jesus said to those who had believed in him, “you are really my followers (disciples). Then you will know the truth and the truth will set you free.”

Dearest beloved brethren, we are the people who have God’s Word. We have it, but do we know it…know it well enough to be able to live by it The Word of God is the only offensive weapon we have in our spiritual arsenal. It is the sharp, two-edged sword of the Spirit. Take away the Word of God, or change God’s Word, or dilute God’s Word and the Church will retreat…we cannot advance with a dull weapon or no weapon at all for that matter. God’s Word is also a lamp to our feet, showing us the way in which we ought to walk. But if we do not know it, how can we hold to it? If we do not know God’s Word, “how then shall we live?”, to quote Francis Shaeffer. If we do not know it and live by it, how can we say we know God?

If you hold to the Word, you are truly followers of Jesus. Then you will know the truth and the truth will set you free. 

Shall we pray? 

© Johannes W H van der Bijl 2023

Nowhere Roads

Psalm 81:8-12                   Isaiah 65:1-7                    Romans 10:1-13           John 8:21-30

Nowhere Roads

Never since the advent of the Enlightenment has there been such a global revival in spiritualism. People from all walks of life are seeking some or other spiritual experience, yearning for an energy or a force beyond themselves that can help them attain inner peace. It is estimated (conservatively, in my humble opinion) that more than half the world’s population dabbles in some form of astrology, magic, or the occult. 

You might well ask then, if they are really seeking a spiritual experience, why do they not turn to the one true God? Purely human endeavours inevitably do not deliver the tranquillity hoped for. And yet people persist even though their ideologies exact unreasonable demands, devotion, sacrifice, and unquestioning commitment from their adherents with little to no lasting or meaningful gratification.  

As I wrote this, I remembered when, as a young child, I tried to fly on a broom like Miss Eglantine Price – the amateur witch in the movie Bedknobs and Broomsticks. I took my mother’s grass broom, climbed up on the roof of our house, said the magic words, and jumped. I don’t need to tell you what happened next. But the saddest part about this story is that I did this over and over again, convinced that if I just said the magic words correctly, I would fly. Thankfully, I am still here today to tell you this tale of utter stupidity…then again, I have heard of others trying to be Batman, Superman, and Spiderman…

But why do so many folks follow these roads to nowhere? Many are highly intelligent, influential, and materially prosperous. And yet, when it comes to things spiritual, it seems as if all reason has been discarded as they talk of energies and crystals and interplanetary conjunctions and achieving an exotic state of metaphysical consciousness. 

Why not turn to the one who has done everything possible to provide eternal peace? Our Gospel passage for today may supply us with at least three basic reasons.

The first is that different folks have different destinations. Jesus said to the unbelieving leaders, “I am going away, and you will look for me, and you will die in your sin. Where I go, you cannot come.” It seems clear that Jesus was referring to his return to the Father in the ascension, to a place where those who did not believe in him simply could not go. 

It is a sad reality that while these leaders sincerely yearned for the Messiah, they did not find him even though he stood right in front of them. They had the very oracles of God, they knew the Scriptures well, they had a godly heritage of faith – patriarchs, prophets, priests, and kings – they had a godly history and a godly law that taught them who God is and what he expected from his people. And yet they did not know him. How was this possible?

In Mark 7:13 Jesus said that the unbelieving leaders nullified the word of God by the tradition that they had handed down. What tradition was this? Well, shortly before, during, and after the Babylonian Exile, the teachers of the law began to apply the Mosaic code to daily life and practice with different applications arising out of practical necessity, convenience, or experience. In time, these unwritten applications were seen as equal to the written law.

Many of these applications or traditions were promoted by one of the two main sects of Judaism at the time of Jesus. The Pharisees. The Pharisees were a sect of largely lower- and middle-class Jews that stood in opposition to the Sadducees, the aristocratic priestly class who governed the Temple and who rejected the validity of any extra-biblical laws or traditions. The considerable controversy regarding the so-called “oral law”, including an internal dispute within the ranks of the Pharisees between the followers of Rabbi Hillel and Rabbi Shummai, culminated in the collection and compilation of these oral laws in written form after the destruction of Jerusalem in AD 70. This compilation later became known as the Mishnah. And then there is also the Talmud, but that’s a story for another time.

These traditions – these “oral laws” with their strict rules and regulations governed all of life and crushed people with unbearable religious demands promising very little in return other than guilt and condemnation. Jesus addressed this when he declared that, in comparison, his yoke was easy, and his burden was light. 

So, when this offer of freedom from bondage to man’s restrictive and unreasonable demands was made, one would have expected the people of Israel to fall over themselves to embrace a truth that would remove their shackles. But they didn’t, did they? In this, they were very much like their ancestors who wanted to return to slavery in Egypt or like our modern-day spiritualist cultists…or like me, jumping off our roof.

The reason for this is simply that if you have different destinations, you have different priorities and different goals and therefore you make different decisions. In our reading from Isaiah God said that he held out his hands all day long to an obstinate people…he revealed himself to them and yet they rejected him because they wanted to pursue their own imaginations. Or in the words of Paul, as they sought to establish their own righteousness, they refused to submit to God’s righteousness. When your whole life has been based upon convictions of your own invention, it is hard to humble yourself and admit you are wrong.

But there is more to this than simply different decisions. People have different destinations because they have different origins…a different starting point, if you will. Jesus said that the reason they could not come to where he would be was because they were from below while he was from above. Their origins were different. “You are of this world,” he said, “I am not of this world.” No matter how ingeniously spiritual the inventions of humans may appear to be, and regardless of how many chills or goosebumps the rituals may deliver, they are always earthly or worldly, and therefore limited, finite, and temporary. 

Now, when Jesus used the word “world” here, he did not mean that all matter was intrinsically evil. That would contradict God’s pronouncement in Genesis 1 and 2. The Scriptures affirm both the physical and spiritual aspects of life. Jesus was called a glutton and a drunkard by his opponents indicating that Jesus was no stranger to good food and wine. 

In this context, the word “world” is used in a negative sense…as an antonym for “heavenly”…like when Jesus said to Nicodemus, “Flesh gives birth to flesh, but the Spirit gives birth to spirit.” (John 3:6) Jesus’ origin is “heavenly” – not of this world – and he shares that origin with those who are born again through the power of the Spirit. Without this spiritual rebirth, the origin of the individual remains “worldly” and therefore bound to the fallen state of the first Adam. 

The rebellion of our first ancestors separated them from God. Sin, iniquity, and lawlessness build a barrier between humans and God. It is only when God breathes new life into those who were dead in their trespasses and sins that their origin changes and consequently their destination changes too. They move from the kingdom of darkness into the kingdom of light. They are no longer under Adam but under Jesus. They are no longer dead but alive. They have been redeemed and adopted into the family of God. So, while that which is physical may not be evil in and of itself, it remains empty and lifeless if it is not regenerated by the Spirit of God. The terms “below” and “above” used here by Jesus indicate different origins and therefore different destinations.

Now, having said that, it is important to note that different destinations and different origins are, in one sense, linked to what we’ve discussed briefly before…different decisions. These leaders of Israel failed to believe…they failed to exercise faith in Jesus, and they failed to exercise faith in God the Father. Jesus told them: “If you do not believe that I AM, you will die in your sins.” Now, that little word “if” presupposes a need for a decision. They needed to respond to the revelation they had received and the revelation they were receiving. If not, their origin and destination would remain the same. 

There is a very precarious tightrope we must walk here between human responsibility and God’s sovereignty. This is, in my humble opinion, an antinomy and a paradox that has divided believers for centuries. On the one hand, it seems clear that God alone initiates all saving relationships…but this does not rule out the necessity for human beings to respond to his call and to repent and to turn back to him...after all, as Paul said, God desires for all people to be saved (1 Timothy 2:4). Those whom God prepared for glory are those who choose to reject their former beliefs and practices to place their faith and trust in him. The two seemingly contradictory propositions work together. 

True, we love him because he first loved us…but there is a response here even though he initiated the relationship. God did not create us to be mindless puppets. We must be weary of trying to make the Bible say things it does not. We like our neat little packages, but the Scriptures can mess with our wrappings and our bows. It is better and, I dare say, appropriately unpretentious, to simply accept that something will always remain in the realm of mystery. 

God in his sovereignty and his infinite mercy and his amazing grace offers salvation through the substitutionary death of Jesus…a reversal of the curse brought upon humanity through the sin of our collective forebears. But if we reject Jesus, we reject the one and only true offer of salvation and we will subsequently die in our sins. 

And what Jesus made perfectly clear in this passage is that if we reject him, we also reject the one who sent him as an offering for sin. “He who sent me is true,” Jesus said, “and what I have heard from him I tell the world.” In other words, the teaching and the claims of Jesus were the words of God...the same God who spoke in the Old Testament was now once more speaking to them again, but they failed to make the connection. Why? Because they had substituted God’s Word with their interpretive traditions…their own imaginations…their own righteousness.

Now, a word of caution here for those who like to dismiss things that are in the Old Testament”. Jesus (as well as Paul, for that matter) repeatedly affirmed and confirmed the Old Testament Scriptures…he often quoted from them and called them as a witness to testify to the truth of his own assertions. Besides, the New Testament tells us that Jesus is the Word…if there is a difference between the Testaments, well then, the Lord himself is a contradiction. No, God has one Word which is in total agreement on all points. The fact that some “teaching tools”, if you will, such as the Festivals, the sacrificial system, and the purity laws, to name a few, have been fulfilled in Jesus does not negate the basic unity of the Scriptures. 

In fact, this is precisely what Jesus was saying here. If the leaders had truly understood the Old Testament Scriptures, they would have recognized Jesus as the same one who spoke to their forefathers in times past through the prophets at many times and in various ways. (Hebrews 1:1) The fact that they did not, reveals their lack of faith in God…period.

In verse 28, Jesus declared that a time would come when they would realize their mistake…when they would see him for who he is…but by then it would be too late. The judgement would be final and irreversible. In their case, it was the destruction of Jerusalem and the Temple and ultimately their own demise. In the case of other unbelievers down through the ages, it is the day of their death. Hebrews 9:27 tells us that it is appointed for humans to die once, but after that comes judgment. The time for decision-making is over…their destination has been sealed for all eternity. 

At the end of time, the cross will serve as the ultimate example of a rejection of debt redeemed. The cross that represents deliverance provided for all who would call on the name of the Lord also represents destruction for those who refuse him. Just like the fiery cloud pillar was darkness to the Egyptians but light to the Israelites, so the cross was at once darkness to the one thief and light to the other. You see, it is the “lifting up of the Son of Man” that ultimately reveals him as the one and only legitimate Judge. 

It is a strange thing that humanity is all too quick to accuse God of injustice when it comes to the final destination of those who refuse to accept his free offer of salvation in Jesus. Strange, but not surprising. “The natural man,” Paul said in 1 Corinthians 2:14, “does not receive the things of the Spirit of God, because they are foolishness to him; nor can he know them, because they are spiritually discerned.” Those who are wise in their own eyes will always judge the graciousness of God in Jesus as folly. Because they are from below, they cannot discern the one who is from above. So, they will continue to search down dead-end alleyways and avenues and no matter how many things they do or don’t do or how many rules they obey or rituals they practice, they will blindly plunge into an eternal separation from God. Jesus is the only way, the only truth, and the only source of life…without him, there is no atonement for sin.

In stark contrast to these teachers of the law, John stated that even as Jesus spoke, many put their faith in him…but they too would be challenged as to the object of that faith as even believers can misplace their faith…but that is the sermon for next time.

Our faith is shaped in many different ways today. In the first century, the people of God were confused by the oral law or the traditions of the elders, even though they had the Scriptures by which they could have determined what was true or not, by simple comparison. Every Jewish boy knew the Torah and the Psalms by heart by the age of ten. 

We also have the Scriptures today, but all too often, many in the modern church take their cues from popular preachers, devotional booklets, self-help tracts, charts, prophetic visions, and messages…without ever measuring them against the teaching of God’s Word. Mahatma Gandhi, an educated and qualified lawyer turned Hindu guru and passive social activist, once said: “You Christians look after a document containing enough dynamite to blow all civilisations to pieces, turn the world upside down, and bring peace to a battle-torn planet. But you treat it as if it is nothing more than a piece of literature.” 

 Dearest beloved brethren, it ought not to be so. We have his Word…other than Jesus himself, this is the greatest gift God has ever given humanity. So, let us decide today to read it, study it, hide it in our hearts, and, once we know what the Scriptures teach, then let us live by what we learn.

Shall we pray?

© Johannes W H van der Bijl 2023

The Light of the World

Psalm 130                       Isaiah 49:1-6                      John 8:12-20

The Light of the World

Can you imagine what it must have been like in the beginning? At first, there was nothing but darkness…and then out of this darkness, there came a voice. “Let there be light.” And there was light…piercing, bright, blinding light…and all that had been unseen was seen…all that had been hidden was revealed…and nothing was ever the same again. The source of this light was neither the sun nor the moon nor any other planetary sphere. The light was simply the light…and with each successive day, this light progressively illuminated a new splendour as the Word of God spoke Creation into being, until, on that final day, it revealed the pinnacle of God’s masterpiece as he breathed his life into Adam. 

But then, in Genesis chapter 3, a thick spiritual darkness invaded the good Creation and like a poisonous gas, it threatened to choke out the breath of life itself. It seemed as if all was lost for a while as things quickly went from bad to worse. Darkness appeared to be stealthily overcoming the light…but every time it looked as if it had conquered, the light stepped in and pushed it back. Seth, Noah, Abraham, Isaac, Jacob, Joseph, Moses, Israel…all bearers of this light even if only in fragile earthen vessels. 

The contrasting images of light and darkness throughout the Scriptures represent a cosmic battle played out on Earth with seen and unseen forces grappling for dominance. As we read the history of the people of God in the Old Testament, we encounter peaks so high and chasms so deep that by the time we arrive at the end of the book of Malachi, we feel rather seasick. 

And then…for four hundred years, the prophetic word was silent. Israel remained captive to the pagan empires of the world save for a brief period of self-rule under the Hasmonean kings. The light faded until it was little more than a memory, its luminant reality recalled in psalms of lament and remembered in the Festivals of Israel and rehearsed in the stories of the past. Those who defied and rebelled against the darkness in the hope of rekindling the light were cruelly crushed and soon all courage was replaced with despondency…but out of the depths of despair, the collective groan of an oppressed people rose like a wisp of smoke from dying embers…Messiah.

And once again, the Spirit of God hovered, not over virgin waters, but over a virgin’s womb as the Word that was in the beginning, the Word that was with God, the Word that was God, manifested his glory as he came to shine in the darkness, to overcome it, and to take back what it had stolen. As before, this Light progressively illuminated a new splendour as the Word of God spoke a new Creation into being, until, on that great day of the resurrection, it revealed the pinnacle of God’s redemptive masterpiece as he breathed life back into the second Adam who, in turn, breathed the same life into the New Israel.

Like no other book in the New Testament, the Gospel of John rehearses and redevelops the images and themes of creation as well as the trials and triumphs of the bearers of the light to present us with a portrait of the one who embodies them all. John begins with the Word, the light, and the life, and ends with the Spirit being breathed once more into a renewed humanity (John 20:22). His Gospel is simply peppered with images of creation revived, redeemed, and restored.

Not only does the life of Jesus mirror the history of Israel as the seed of Abraham, but also the history of all Creation as the seed of the woman. But John also presents Jesus as greater still. As we have seen, the opening verses of John parallel the opening verses of Genesis. Jesus is portrayed as the Word that spoke all things into existence, the light that was the life of humanity, and the source of living water that irrigated and sustained the world. 

So, when we read Jesus’ statement in our Gospel lesson for today, “I AM the light of the world. Whoever follows me will never walk in darkness, but will have the light of life.”…when read this statement, we should not pass by too quickly. 

The statement was made in the Temple area at the end of the Feast of Tabernacles, in fact, the day after the final day of the festival. It also followed on the heels of a confrontation between Jesus and the crowd and the law-breaking teachers of the law. There’s a lot going on here…not only is Jesus the light that exposes the abuse of the law (in the flawed judgement of the leaders with both Jesus and, if you will, the woman caught in adultery), but Jesus is also the light that illuminates the truth of the law (its correct interpretation and application). 

And, Jesus added, life is to be had in following him as that light…to follow Jesus not like Adam who followed the devil…to follow Jesus and not rebel like the Israelites in the wilderness…and, unfortunately, even in the Promised land.

Now, we need to keep in mind that during the Festival of Tabernacles, huge candelabras were set up in the Temple area and lit every night. The idea was to recall the fiery cloud pillar that led the Israelites out of Egypt and through the wilderness to the Promised Land. Whether Jesus was standing close to these structures or not doesn’t really matter because of the subject matter of the festival itself, but they would have served as handy visual aids. 

Again, we are dealing with one of the several “I AM” statements of Jesus and, once again, in this one he no doubt meant for his hearers to recall Moses’ encounter with God, the Great I AM, at the burning bush. But, I believe, Jesus added a broader dimension to this call narrative. As God was in the burning bush and in the fiery cloud pillar, calling and leading his people to freedom from bondage, so Jesus was calling and leading his people from darkness and death to light and life. And as that fiery cloud pillar was darkness to the enemies of Israel and light to the people of God, so Jesus was light to those who had eyes to see…and as their enemies were overcome while they were liberated and, indeed to go back even further, as the light dispelled the primaeval darkness on that 1st day of Creation, Jesus too would soon wrestle with the forces of darkness and conquer them. 

However, it is important to note that Jesus was not standing in the court of Pharaoh, nor was he standing in the wilderness, but in the Temple of Israel…and the object of his deliverance is not one nation but all nations. Jesus declared himself to be the Light of the World…that which Israel had been designed to be (even from the time when God first called Abraham to follow him, the goal was the blessing of all nations) …Jesus was and is what Israel was meant to be and yet had failed to be. If Israel had been faithful to the Lord, the Gentiles would have seen the greatness of their God and would have been drawn to him (Deuteronomy 4:6). But because Israel insisted on following other gods and other laws that did not happen. Like the modern revisionist Church, they sought to be like the world and therefore lost their attractive unique witness. So, Isaiah spoke about a new light…a Servant who would be identified with Israel but who would also transcend Israel. 

But Jesus did not just reveal his own identity in his weighty and loaded statement…he also revealed the identity of his own people. They can be identified as those who follow him. It is those who walk in the light who will have life. “Following” in this sense presupposes a relationship of faith, trust, and dependency, as well as an identification with the cause and the will of Jesus. John expanded on this thought in his first letter where he wrote: “If we say we have fellowship with Him yet walk in the darkness, we lie and do not practice the truth. But if we walk in the light as He is in the light, we have fellowship with one another, and the blood of Jesus His Son cleanses us from all sin.” 

There is an inseparable connection between the Light and those who walk in the light…in other words, those who follow him are now the new light bearers. Like Israel was meant to be, so we are now witnesses to the world. We are meant to walk as he walked…to walk in the light as he is the light.

Of course, the Pharisees immediately challenged him by claiming that Jesus invalidated his own witness because it had no further references. Rabbinic tradition rejected any witness without other corroboration. This was based on their exposition of a law found in Deuteronomy 19:15.

“A single witness shall not suffice against a person for any crime or for any wrong in connection with any offence that he has committed. Only on the evidence of two witnesses or of three witnesses shall a charge be established.” 

Jesus did not dispute this as he had already said in John 5:31, “If I bear witness of myself, my witness is not true”, and then he proceeded to refer to other witnesses such as John the Baptist, the Father, his words, and his works. But here, Jesus boldly claimed that his witness did not need corroboration because his identity surpasses human judgment. 

In verse 18 he claimed unity and equality with the Father while maintaining their distinction one from the other. Consequently, as God, he could bear witness to himself since no man can bear witness for him – they didn’t know anything about him…where he was from nor where he was going…and worse…they didn’t even know his Father. You see, by questioning Jesus’ origin in verse 19 they unwittingly revealed their own. 

Jesus had already made it clear that if they knew the Scriptures, they would know him. Nicodemus realised this partially when he came to Jesus under cover of darkness. “Rabbi,” he said, “we know that you are a teacher come from God; for no one can do these signs that you do unless God is with him.” However, by not recognising the Father’s witness to the Son in his words and works, these teachers of the law revealed that they neither knew the Father nor the Son…in other words, they did not know the God they professed to follow. They were walking in darkness, not in the light.

But we need to exercise caution before we pass judgement on the Pharisees. In his homily on this passage, John Chrysostom said: “Beware lest we also who make boast of the rightness of our faith dishonour God by not manifesting a life agreeable to the faith, causing Him to be blasphemed. For He would have the Christian to be the teacher of the world, its leaven, its salt, its light. And what is that light? It is a life which shines and has in it no dark thing. Light is not useful to itself, nor leaven, nor salt, but shows its usefulness towards others, and so we are required to do good, not to ourselves only, but to others.”   

(John Chrysostom, Homily 52 on the Gospel of John, John 8:18 (4).)

Dearest beloved brethren, we have the light of life shining in us. We know both the Father and the Son, and we have the Holy Spirit residing within us, leading us in the truth of His Word. So, let us for a moment, lay bare our lives before the one to whom all hearts are open, all desires known, and from whom no secrets are hidden, and let us ask him to examine us and expose any residual trace of darkness in us. 

As the light of the world, Jesus shines in the darkness through us, his children. If the light you think you have in you is actually darkness, how deep that darkness is! 

Shall we pray?

© Johannes W H van der Bijl 2023

Progressive Healing

Homily on Haggai 2:1-9 and Mark 8:22-26

I love reading the records of Jesus' healing miracles. Most of them are pretty straightforward. In many ways, they follow the first-century Greco-Roman pattern for gift-giving. There’s a request or a requirement expressed in faith or an anticipation of a favourable result, there’s a positive response, and there’s a reaction, usually one of gratitude.

 

But as with most things, there are exceptions…one being the healing of the man at a pool steeped in pagan superstition. There was no request made in faith or otherwise…the man didn’t even know who Jesus was…and there was a rather bad response in the end that appears to have been vindictive as he seems to have snitched on Jesus. No thankfulness to speak of…no gratitude…

And then there’s this healing in Bethsaida. While there certainly was a request made by the blind man’s friends, both the response and the reaction were a little different. The response was performed in private, the healing was partially delayed, and any form of public reaction seems to have been prevented. 

Now, Bethsaida was an interesting place. On one hand, it was home to five apostles, far more than any other New Testament town. It was also the target of one of Jesus’ “Woe” sayings in which he lashed out at Bethsaida and two other towns for their failure to repent (Matthew 11:21). 

Recently in 2017, due to the receding waterline of the Sea of Galilee, archaeologists managed to uncover ruins old enough to be the biblical Bethsaida. Unlike the previous site, this one presented evidence of a Jewish presence including a fisherman’s house complete with bones of kosher fish. But the archaeologists also discovered a large Roman bathhouse and evidence of pagan worship: bronze incense shovels like those found in Roman temples and votive objects in the shape of boat anchors and grape clusters.

We know that Philip the Tetrarch made this his second capital and renamed it Julias in AD 30 in honour of Livia-Julia, the wife of the emperor Augustus and mother of Tiberius, but that probably happened at the end of a long process of paganization. Perhaps this was the reason why Peter and Andrew, James and John, and perhaps Philip, relocated to Capernaum and perhaps this was the reason why Jesus refused to perform the miracle in the town…but that is pure speculation on my part.

But what intrigues me the most about this healing was that it seemed to have been progressive. After having wiped the eyes of the blind man with spittle (an action that reminds me of a mother wiping sleep out of her child’s eyes), the man testified that the healing was incomplete. He saw people, but indistinctly…which may indicate that he had not been born blind because apparently, he knew what he ought to have been seeing. After a second laying on of hands, the man’s sight was fully restored. 

Why the progressive healing? Why was the man not healed immediately? Was this perhaps another one of Jesus’ acted parables – perhaps a lesson he was trying to teach his disciples – that faith grew gradually and with difficulty? All of them had to unlearn many things they had been taught and we see them struggling with the relearning process all the way up to the ascension and, some might argue, even beyond the ascension.

It is interesting to note that right after this progressive healing Peter both gets it right by declaring Jesus to be the Messiah as well as gets it wrong by attempting to prevent Jesus from fulfilling his sacrificial ministry. In fact, all the stories that follow on the heels of this incident in Bethsaida, seem to indicate a gradual growth in spiritual sight, with Jesus repeatedly returning to the theme of his death, a theme that was only comprehended after the resurrection. 

Now, I dare say that this is not totally unlike our own growth in spiritual awareness. Like Paul, we often see things through a glass darkly…or like this blind man, we see people walking about like trees. Or like the Jews during the restoration period, we may think back to a time of former glory, when our Christian walk was vibrant and pulsating with spiritual energy. Or like David, it may be that the joy of our salvation needs to be restored. 

Perhaps we need a second touch from our Lord Jesus so that our focus may be redirected from what appears to be insufficient and inadequate, to that beatific vision of the heavenly Jerusalem where the river of the Holy Spirit flows from the throne of God the Father and of the Lamb, bringing life in abundance through us to the nations. 

Gratitude or thankfulness is often a product of corrected vision and perception. It is only once our spiritual sight has been restored that we will be able to see that God will fill his house with glory…a glory that will be greater than the former…and that he will give peace. 

© Johannes W H van der Bijl 2023