Talking Outrageously To Legalists, Part 1

Today on Fellowship in the Word, Pastor Bill Gebhardt challenges you to become a fully functioning follower of Jesus Christ. He knew it created confrontation and he wanted to talk about himself. And what he wanted to say was outrageous. He wants to say outrageous things about himself.

He's going to make some of the most startling claims ever made. G. Campbell Morgan in his commentary on John said this, what Jesus said on this day cost him his life. Thank you for joining us today on this edition of Fellowship in the Word with Pastor Bill Gebhardt. Fellowship in the Word is the radio ministry of Fellowship Bible Church located in Metairie, Louisiana. Let's join Pastor Bill Gebhardt now as once again he shows us how God's Word meets our world. Open your Bibles to John chapter five.

Seems like an unusual introduction for me. But we're in a series called The Conversations of Jesus Christ. And the conversation I want to go to is in John chapter five and the introduction are the early verses of John five. We have dealt in these conversations that Jesus talked to a skeptic named Nathaniel. He has talked to a religious insider named Nicodemus and then he talked to an immoral outsider and the woman at the well, the Samaritan. And now he's going to speak to legalistic, extremely religious Pharisees.

But the story that sets it up is intriguing. John five, verse one. After these things, there was a feast of the Jews and Jesus went up to Jerusalem. And now, he says, there is in Jerusalem by the sheep gate a pool, which is called in Hebrew Bethesda, having five porticos. Bethesda means house of outpouring or house of grace. It's kind of ironic how this plays out. And in these lay a multitude of those who are sick, blind, lame and withered.

Notice there is a multitude of people here. And then in your Bibles, you'll see that there are brackets. And the brackets mean that a lot of the early manuscripts don't have this verse and a half.

It's been there, though, the idea to explain the story as it goes along. And it says, waiting for the moving of the waters for an angel of the Lord went down at certain seasons into the pool and stirred up the water. And whoever then whoever then first after the stirring up of the water stepped in was made well for whatever disease in which he was afflicted.

Now, that's the superstitious tradition. I think it's a tragic scene when you think about it. Blind people, invalids, people with all kinds of infirmity and somebody yells, the water stirred.

And everybody runs the jump in the pool. I don't believe, by the way, that that's the way God operates. I believe that's the superstition of the people at the time and is used here to explain the man's response to Jesus. And a man was there who had been ill for 38 years. And when Jesus saw him lying there, he knew that he had already been a long time in that condition. And so Jesus just walks up to him and says, do you wish to get well?

That's it. The sick man answered and said, sir, I have no man to put me into the pool when the water stirred up. But while I am coming, another steps down before me.

Just imagine 38 years of that. He can't walk. So he's on a pallet and then someone says, someone stirred the water so the man, I can see him laying on his side, trying to drag himself to the pool. And then by the time he gets so many feet from the pool, then he hears the splash of water and then he doesn't get to go in. Jesus said to him, get up, pick up your pallet, walk. That's it. Get up, pick up your pallet and walk.

Immediately, the man became well, picked up his pallet and began to walk. Now that's a story. It's an interesting story. It's a story of healing, but in a most unusual way. First of all, there was a multitude of people there that needed to be healed. How many did Jesus heal?

Just one. Secondly, by the way, we often hear in our day that the way, the key to being healed is to really have a lot of faith. You'll find out that this man has no faith.

Zero. In fact, this guy doesn't even know who Jesus is. But he's the one that gets healed.

But there's something in it that sort of lays the groundwork. The last phrase that John writes in verse eight. It was a Sabbath on that day. So Jesus goes out of his way to go to the pool of Bethesda on a particular day, the day of the Sabbath, and heals one man. When he heals that man, he makes sure it's an invalid and he tells him, look, get up, but pick up your pallet. By the way, he doesn't need the pallet anymore. Pick up the pallet and walk. Verse 10. Now the religious people enter. So the Jews were saying to the man who was cured, it is the Sabbath. It's not permissible for you to carry your pallet.

Really? Thirty-eight years a guy couldn't walk. You see him walking. No one even says, hey, you're walking.

I'm always amazed how blind religion can make you. You've got your pallet. You're walking with your pallet.

Notice he answered. He said, he who made me well was the one who said to me, he said, pick up your pallet and walk. That's why I have my pallet. He told me to have it. They ask him, who is the man who said that to you?

Pick up your pallet and walk. But the man who was healed did not know who it was. He didn't know who Jesus is. For Jesus has slipped away while there was a crowd in that place. And afterward, Jesus found him in the temple and he said to him, behold, you have become well.

Do not sin anymore so that nothing worse happens to you. And the man went away and he told the Jews that it was Jesus who made him well. I'm not even sure he's a man of high character. He was afraid of the Jews, afraid of the religious leaders, we often are. And so when he found out it was Jesus, he went right to the leaders and said it was Jesus who did this to me. For this reason, the Jews were persecuting Jesus because he was doing things on the Sabbath. Wow. The Sabbath becomes instrumental and key here.

I love what Chuck Swindoll writes about this whole section. He says this, according to Exodus 20, 11, the Hebrew people were to stop all work because the creator rested on the sixth day of creation. Because he was tired.

Of course not. Omnipotence never needs the rest. The Hebrew term translated rest is the word Shabbat, which means to cease. The Lord ceased work because he had completed his creative work, at which time he called his creation good. By sundown on the sixth day, he had provided everything his creatures needed to thrive and to fulfill their creative purpose. He created humanity to worship and enjoy him forever. God set aside the seventh day, the Sabbath, the ceasing time, as it were, to be a perpetual gift that commemorates God's creation of the world and celebrates his provision.

He intended it to be a time of rest and feasting and enjoying family and more than anything, celebrating his provision and protection and worshiping God. By the time of Jesus, however, the legalistic Pharisees had turned this wonderful gift of grace into a toilsome, tedious burden. The simple command, rest, the Pharisees added a long list of prohibitions.

And just in case they overlooked something, they established 39 different categories of forbidden activities. Carrying, burning, extinguishing, finishing, writing, erasing, cooking, washing, sewing, tearing, knotting, untying, shaping, plowing, planning, reaping, harvesting, threshing, winnowing, selecting, sifting, grinding, kneading, combing, spinning, dying, chain stitching, warping, weaving, unraveling, building, demolishing, trapping, shearing, slaughtering, skinning, tanning, smoothing, and marking. How ironic, he says, that people had to work so hard to keep the Sabbath. You see, this story is not really about healing.

But by the way, it's not really about the Sabbath and legalism either. Jesus used the healing of the invalid at the pool of Bethesda and the fact that it infuriated the legalistic Pharisees for one reason. He wants to talk about himself. That's why he did it. He knew it created confrontation and he wanted to talk about himself. And what he wanted to say was outrageous. He wants to say outrageous things about himself. He's going to make some of the most startling claims ever made. G. Campbell Morgan in his commentary on John said this, what Jesus said on this day cost him his life. But he wanted to say it. You see, he's going to answer a question that they ask in verse 12. Who was the man who said this to you?

Jesus says, let me tell you who I am. And he makes the most outrageous claims. Five of them. Five outrageous claims.

The first one is this. He claims to be equal to God. He claims to be equal to the Father in essence.

In his essence, he claims to be equal to God. That's what he says in verse 17. He said, but he answered them and said, my father is working until now and I myself am working. Well, one of the first things he did that infuriated him and it shows up in other passages in the gospels, he said, my father. Jews never said that. You never, when you talked about God, said my father. You might say Elohim, you rarely or never would say Yahweh, the Lord, but you would never say my father. But Jesus says, my father is working until now and I myself am working. This is a Sabbath and my father is working. And I am working. You know why? Because I'm just the same as my father.

That's my essence. You see, God created a problem for the Pharisees in their view of the Sabbath. The Pharisees had all of these, it's just hundreds of laws and ordinances to guard the Sabbath.

It's incredible what they had done. But they were stuck with a question when it comes to God. The question would be this, does God keep the law?

Now, what would you say? I mean, just off the top of your head, I think you'd have to say, yeah, I guess God would. If anyone's going to keep the law, God would keep the law. Well, the problem is that if God keeps the law, then does God keep the Sabbath?

You see, that's a problem for them. So they came up with one of the rules to sort of get around it, which I find was really fascinating. One of the laws they had is that you could carry food or items from your home around your home. But you could not carry them to another home. You couldn't carry anything from your house to somebody else's house. But you could carry anything you wanted around your house. But you couldn't carry anything above your shoulders, okay? It couldn't be something like that that was heavy that you put up over your shoulders. It's just something that was kind of light. So you could do light work, but you could only do it in your house.

So the reason they came up with that was to answer this dilemma they're in. What's God's house? They said God's house is creation. Everything in creation is God's house. So God doesn't leave his house on the Sabbath to go to another house.

He's always in his house. And the kind of work God does on the Sabbath is light work. He doesn't carry anything above his shoulders on the Sabbath. He just does light work on the Sabbath.

That's how they solved it. That's why Jesus uses a word that's really a word for working. He says, my Father is working now. And I, he said, am working. My Father never slows down.

It's a present tense. He just keeps on working. The blessings and the mercy and the grace and the love of God never rest. He said, I'm doing it. I am the same as my Father. As my Father works every Sabbath, I work every Sabbath. You see, as my Father is God of the Sabbath, I am Lord of the Sabbath.

He's drawn a sense of equivalency. Now hold your place with me and go to Hebrews chapter 1. And see how this is, the idea that he is the same essence as God is addressed by the writer of the book of Hebrews.

I just want to look at one verse. Verse 3 of Hebrews chapter 1. Hold your place in John 5. In verse 3, the writer of Hebrews says this. And he, that is Jesus, and he is the radiance of his glory.

That's the Father. He says, and Jesus is the radiance of the God, the Father's glory. He says, and the exact representation of his nature and upholds all things by the word of his power.

The writer of Hebrews says he is the exact representation of the nature of God. Now that's writing long after Jesus had said this back to John 5. Jesus is saying, I am equal to the Father in my essence. Now if you say, are you sure the verse says that?

Yes, look at the next verse. The Jews got it. Verse 18, for this reason therefore the Jews were seeking all the more to kill him because he was not only breaking the Sabbath, but he was also calling God his own Father.

And he was making himself equal with God. See, one thing you've got to understand about the Jews, they get it. When Jesus makes claims, the Jews get it. It's interesting today, a lot of people will look at Scripture, I don't know how they do it, but they'll say, well, Jesus never claimed to be God. Jesus has never, the Jews never thought that.

Every time Jesus spoke, they said, we know exactly what you're saying. You claim that you are equal to God. You are claiming that you have the same essence as God.

Yes. Secondly, he claims not only to have the same essence with the Father, but he claims to do the same works as the Father. He says, therefore Jesus answered and said to them, truly, truly, amen, amen.

This is true. He uses those terms for emphasis. Truly, truly, I say to you, the Son can do nothing of himself unless it is something he sees the Father doing, for whatever the Father does, these things the Son also does in like manner. Jesus says, look, in one way I am so connected. The Trinity is all through these verses. He said, I am so connected to the Father.

There's no doubt about that. He said, I don't act independent. The Son and the Father act in a perfectly cohesive way within the context of the Trinity.

But let me tell you something. He said, whatever the Father does, now what can God do? What does God do? He goes, that's exactly what I do. And in whatever manner the Father does it, that's the manner I do it in.

Now, that's outrageous. You see, what a claim that is. Everything that God does, I do. And the way that God does it is the same way I do it.

Now, notice the motive of this relationship. Verse 20, for the Father loves the Son, and he shows him all things that he himself is doing. And the Father will show him greater works than knees so that you will marvel.

Hey, if you think a guy couldn't walk for 38 years and I said get up and walk and carry your pallet, you think that's big? Wait till you see what I do in the future. You see, wait till I say Lazarus, come forth. Wait till you see that I pay for the sins of the world on the cross. Wait till you see that I rise from the dead. You will marvel then.

These are even greater. Again, outrageous talk. He claims to be equal with the Father in his essence, and he claims to be equal with the Father in his works. Again, hold your place, and this time go with me to the Book of Colossians, chapter 1. And watch how Paul affirms this.

Verse 15, Paul talking about Jesus Christ. Paul says he is the image of the invisible God, the firstborn of creation. For by him all things were created, both in the heavens and on earth, visible and invisible, whether thrones or dominions or rulers or authorities, all things have been created through him and for him.

Now, when you see that terminology, he's saying two things. Everything that's physical in the universe, he said, the Son of God created. Everything, by the way, in the universe that's spiritual, he created. When you see thrones and dominions, he's talking about angelic beings. He says when you see the elect angels, the Son created them.

You see the fallen angels that we call demons? The Son created them. You see, he created everything, everything spiritual and everything physical. Then he says in verse 17, he is before all things, and in him all things hold together. He is also the head of the body, the church, and he is the beginning, the firstborn from the dead, so that he himself will come to have first place in everything. For it was the Father's good pleasure for, he says, for all the fullness to dwell in him. He reiterates that in chapter 2, verse 9, for in him all the fullness of the deity dwells in bodily form.

He also says in verse 3 of chapter 2 to the church of Colossae, in whom in Christ are hidden all the treasures of wisdom and knowledge. What does he know? Everything.

What has he done? He created everything. You see, the writers pick right up on this in the New Testament, but back when Christ is speaking these back to John 5 now, when he is speaking this, the audience is not made up of believers. It's audience of unbelievers. And so Jesus Christ claims to be equal with the Father in his essence and in his work, and now he, verse 21, he claims to be equal with the Father in power. He says, for, let me explain the explanatory guard, the word for, for just as the Father raises the dead and gives them life, even so the Son also gives life to whom he wishes.

Wow. Jesus Christ is saying, look, I can raise the dead. I can give spiritual life to people. You see, I bestow eternal life. Now, when you hear a man talking like that, this seems outrageous to them.

But he says he is equal. He said, I can give life even to the dead. No one else can do that, by the way, but God. I mean, think of us. We have someone we love, and they become what we call terminally ill. We'll do anything, won't we? We'll send them anywhere we can for treatment. We'll do anything we can to help them. We'll give them as much comfort. We'll serve them.

I mean, we'll devote ourselves to them. But when they're dead, there's not a thing we can do. All we can do is mourn. We have no power.

There's nothing we can do about it. Jesus says, no, I can give life like that. I have the same kind of power that God has. He claims to have the ultimate resurrection power, creative power, underived and uncaused.

That's a staggering claim. Remember, when Lazarus had died, Jesus just simply walks up to a tomb and says, Lazarus, come forth. But he said something in that whole episode as well. He said, I am the resurrection and the life. These statements are so familiar to us, but they are staggering.

These are the most outrageous statements a human being can make. And Jesus Christ makes them. He claims to be equal with the Father in His essence, in His works, and in His power, but also in His authority. Notice what happens here in verse 22. He says, for not even the Father judges anyone, but He has given all judgment to the Son. I'm going to judge. Now, this for the Jews has got to be hard.

Let me explain why. Again, hold your place, but this time go back to Genesis chapter 18 with me. Genesis 18. Because I want you to see something from the Old Testament.

Genesis 18 is that God is about to destroy Solomon and Gomorrah, so Abraham comes to God and says, let's make a deal. Now, you're such a great guy and a great God, you wouldn't destroy Sodom if it had all these righteous people in it. And God goes, no, no, I wouldn't do that. Well, would you do it if there were a little less righteous people?

No, I wouldn't do that. And he kept going with God in this. But he says something here that was all through the Old Testament, certainly believed by the Jews, not only of someone like Abraham, but of the Jews of Jesus' day. Verse 25, Abraham talking to God says, far be it from you to do such a thing to slay the righteous with the wicked, so that the righteous and the wicked are treated alike.

Far be it from you. He says, shall not the judge of all the earth deal justly? What is God in the Old Testament? God the Father's judge? In fact, let's go back to what Jesus said then in John 5.

Jesus just said, for not even the Father judges anyone, and he's given all judgment to the Son. You see, when you read in Genesis, who's the Creator? God. In the beginning, God created. That's God the Father. But when you read John chapter 1 and Colossians chapter 1, who's the Creator? The Son. In the Old Testament, God the Father's the judge. In the New Testament, God the Son's the judge.

And Jesus would say, that's right, because we're God. And you can listen to Fellowship in the Word online. At that website, you will find not only today's broadcast, but also many of our previous audio programs as well. At Fellowship in the Word, we are thankful for those who financially support our ministry and make this broadcast possible. We ask all of our listeners to prayerfully consider how you might help this radio ministry continue its broadcast on this radio station by supporting us monthly or with just a one-time gift. Support for our ministry can be sent to Fellowship in the Word 4600 Clearview Parkway, Metairie, Louisiana 7006. If you would be interested in hearing today's message in its original format, that is as a sermon that Pastor Bill delivered during a Sunday morning service at Fellowship Bible Church, then you should visit our website, fbcnola.org. That's F-B-C-N-O-L-A dot O-R-G. At our website, you will find hundreds of Pastor Bill's sermons. You can browse through our sermon archives to find the sermon series you are looking for, or you can search by title. Once you find the message you are looking for, you can listen online, or if you prefer, you can download the sermon and listen at your own convenience. And remember, you can do all of this absolutely free of charge. Once again, our website is fbcnola.org. For Pastor Bill Gebhardt, I'm Jason Gebhardt, thanking you for listening to Fellowship in the Word. .