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Theology of John · Reformed Thinking

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  Hello, and welcome to another edition of Reformed Thinking.
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  I'm really glad you're here with us.
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  It's good to be here. You know, if you've been
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  listening to this show for a while, you know that we really
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  like to step back. We step back from the just the
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  frantic pace of the Daily News cycle.
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  We want to settle our minds on things that have some real
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  weight ideas that have, you know, stood the test of
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  centuries. That's right, you really have
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  to. We live in a culture of sound
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  bites and hot takes. But the Christian faith, it's
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  built on something much more solid.
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  It is. It requires us to slow down,
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  open the text, and really think about what's actually there.
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  And today we are turning our attention to one of the well,
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  one of the most well known figures in the entire New
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  Testament. We're going to be looking at the
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  theology of John. Big topic.
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  It is, and I have to be honest with you, when I started
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  prepping for this, looking at our source material, The Moody
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  Handbook of Theology, I realized I had a bit of AI.
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  Guess a caricature in my head. OK, when I think of John, I
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  usually picture the apostle of love.
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  You know the image. I do.
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  It's very common, the gentle elderly man.
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  Exactly. Maybe a bit soft spoken, telling
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  everyone to just, you know, get along and love one another.
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  We tend to domesticate the apostles, I think, and John gets
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  that treatment more than most. He really does.
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  But if you actually look at the text, the Gospel, the epistles,
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  and then certainly Revelation, that soft image doesn't really
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  hold up, does it? That's what I found.
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  It is intense stuff. It is.
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  While John certainly talks about love, his theology is It's
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  rigorous, it's high. He presents us with what is
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  probably the most exalted view of Jesus Christ in the entire
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  Bible. He's not just giving us warm
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  feelings, He's presenting the absolute deity of Christ, a
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  sharp binary between light and darkness and a a view of the end
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  times that is both terrifying and majestic.
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  So that's our mission for this deep dive.
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  So we want to understand who Jesus is through the eyes of his
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  closest earthly friend. Right.
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  We're going to move from the fishing boats of Galilee all the
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  way to the visions of Patmos. So let's start with the man
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  himself who was John. Because again, my mental image
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  is, you know, poor fisherman. And that's the first thing we
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  need to correct. He was a fisherman, yes, he was
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  the son of Zebedee and the brother of James.
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  They worked on the Sea of Galilee.
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  But the text in Mark's Gospel gives us a very specific detail
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  that kind of changes that picture of poverty.
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  It mentions they had hired servants in their fishing
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  business. Hired servants so they weren't
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  just out there, you know, solo in a rowboat.
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  That's the clear implication. I mean, if you have hired
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  servants, you are running a business, right?
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  This implies a certain level of economic standing.
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  It wasn't a subsistence operation where they were just
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  eating what they cost day-to-day.
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  They had employees, they had a payroll.
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  So when John left his Nets to follow Jesus, he wasn't leaving
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  behind a life of nothing. Not at all.
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  He was walking away from a profitable venture, a family
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  business. That had some real weight to the
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  sacrifice, doesn't it? It's one thing to leave a dead
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  end job. It's another thing entirely to
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  walk away from a business that's actually making money.
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  It is now Speaking of family, the research pointed out a
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  connection to Jesus that I had, I mean completely missed before.
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  It's a detail a lot of people skim over, but if you compare
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  the accounts of the women at the cross looking at Matthew, Mark
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  and John, it appears that John's mother, Salome was the sister of
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  Mary, the mother of Jesus. Wait a second.
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  So that would make John and Jesus.
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  First cousins. That blows my mind.
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  First cousins? I had no idea.
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  And it really helps explain the intimacy of their relationship.
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  Of course, it might also explain why Salome, his mother, felt
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  comfortable enough to ask Jesus for those special positions for
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  her sons in the Kingdom. She was family.
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  She was his aunt. Exactly.
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  But beyond even that blood tie, John was part of what we often
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  the inner circle. The inner circle?
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  That sounds pretty exclusive. It was exclusive.
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  Jesus had the 70, then he had the 12 disciples, but then
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  within the 12 he had the three Peter, James and John and these
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  three were Privy to moments in Jesus ministry that the other 9
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  disciples were simply not. What kind of moments are we
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  talking about here? The highest of highs and the
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  lowest of lows. I mean, John witnessed the
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  transfiguration. He saw Christ's glory revealed
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  on that mountain. Wow.
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  He was there for the raising of Jairus's daughter from the dead.
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  An incredible miracle. But he was also there close by
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  during the agony in the Garden of Gethsemane.
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  So he saw the Lord's divine power, but he also saw his
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  deepest human suffering up close.
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  And he refers to himself in the Gospel, sort of humbly, as the
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  disciple whom Jesus loved. He does, and you see that play
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  out. He sat beside Jesus at the Last
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  Supper in the place of honor. Right next to him.
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  And maybe the most touching detail of all is what happened
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  at the cross. In his dying moments, Jesus
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  entrusted the care of his own mother, Mary, to John.
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  Not to his other brothers. No, not to his half brothers,
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  James or Jude. He gave that responsibility to
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  John. That just speaks volumes about
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  John's character and their relationship.
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  It really does. So he witnesses the
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  resurrection. He sees the Lord in the upper
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  room. He meets him by the sea in
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  Galilee. But John's story doesn't end in
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  the Gospels, does it? He becomes this major figure in
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  the early church. A pillar, as the apostle Paul
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  calls him in Galatians. A pillar.
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  He eventually moved to Ephesus, which was a major center of
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  Christianity. And unlike the other apostles,
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  who were mostly martyred much earlier, John lived to be a very
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  old man. How old are we talking?
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  Well, according to Irenaeus, who was a disciple of Polycarp, who
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  was a disciple of John. Who A direct?
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  Line, a Direct Line, Irenaeus says John lived into the reign
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  of the Emperor Trajan. That brings us to around 1898 or
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  even later. He was the elder statesman of
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  the faith, the last living link to the earthly ministry of
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  Jesus. So we had this man, a former
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  businessman, a cousin of Jesus and eyewitness to glory and
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  suffering, living in Ephesus as an old man, and he leaves us
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  with this significant body of writing.
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  A very significant body, the Gospel of John, 3 epistles and
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  the Book of Revelation. Let's talk about the Gospel
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  first. It just feels so different from
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  Matthew, Mark and Luke. It is profoundly different.
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  We call Matthew, Mark and Luke the synoptic Gospels.
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  Right, because they share a similar view, a synopsis.
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  Exactly. They tell the story in a similar
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  way from a similar perspective, but 92% of the content in the
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  Gospel of John is unique. You won't find it in the
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  Synoptics. 92%, that's a massive difference.
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  It's huge and it tells us something about his purpose,
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  John wrote last. Traditionally, we date the
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  Gospel to between 8080 and 95. South Matthew, Mark and Luke
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  were already circulating they. Were so he likely intended to
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  supplement what was already out there.
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  He wasn't writing to a specific group, like Matthew writing to
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  the Jews or Luke to the Gentiles.
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  John seems to be writing for the Church and for the world in
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  general. And he's very, very clear about
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  why he wrote it. He doesn't leave us guessing at
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  all. No, he states his purpose
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  explicitly in chapter 20, verses 30 and 31.
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  He says these have been written so that you may believe that
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  Jesus is the Christ, the Son of God, and that believing you may
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  have life in His name. So it's an evangelistic book.
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  It's evangelistic and it's apologetic.
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  He organizes the entire narrative around specific signs
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  or miracles that are meant to demonstrate Jesus's authority
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  and identity, compelling the reader to make a decision.
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  Is this the Messiah or not? And the language he uses is so
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  specific, you see certain words just popping up over and over
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  and over again. Key vocabulary is central to
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  John. Think about it, light, life and
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  love. He uses the word light 21 times.
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  Life is used 35 times and love 31 times.
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  These are his great theological anchors.
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  OK, so moving on from the Gospel to his epistles, first, second
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  and third John, these feel a bit more reactive, like he's
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  addressing specific problems. That's a good way to put it
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  first. John is absolutely a combat
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  manual. A combat manual.
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  I like it. It was written to fight false
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  teachers, specifically an early form of Gnosticism that was
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  denying the true humanity of Christ.
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  He calls us the spirit of Antichrist.
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  And he was also correcting spiritual laxity and
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  worldliness. He wanted to give his readers
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  tests, you know, ways to be sure that their fellowship with God
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  was genuine. And second, John is addressed to
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  the chosen lady. Is that a real person or a
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  church? It's debated, but the text seems
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  to suggest it's likely a specific prominent woman who had
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  a church meeting in her home and John's writing to her with a
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  warning. A warning about hospitality.
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  Which sounds kind of harsh, doesn't it?
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  It does out of context, but the context is key here.
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  He warns against showing hospitality to false teachers.
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  These itinerant preachers were traveling around spreading
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  heresy, and John says do not bring them into your house.
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  Do not give them a platform. Do not financially support their
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  destructive work. Truth matters more than a
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  superficial politeness. As a hard word.
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  But I see the logic. You don't fund the people who
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  are trying to tear down the truth you stand on.
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  Precisely. And third John?
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  That one's addressed to a man named Geus, and it deals with
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  church politics, for lack of a better term.
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  There was a man in the church named Diotrophes who loved to be
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  first. He loved preeminence and he was
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  causing all sorts of trouble, even refusing to welcome
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  messengers from John. John condemns that pride and
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  encourages Gaius to keep walking in the truth and supporting
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  those who do. So we got the Gospel, the
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  epistles, and finally Revelation.
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  Revelation written most likely during the intense persecution
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  under the Emperor Domitian. So it was.
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  Written to a church that was suffering.
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  Deeply suffering. So it's a book of comfort,
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  really. It pulls back the curtain on
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  history to reveal the final triumph of Jesus Christ.
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  It shows that despite what Rome does, or what any earthly power
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  does, Jesus is the King who judges and redeems.
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  It's the grand consummation of all Old Testament prophecy.
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  So that is the incredible library that John left us.
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  Now let's get into the theology itself.
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  The outline calls this first section the doctrine of
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  Revelation. How does John understand how God
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  speaks to us? John presents revelation in two
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  primary interwoven ways, through the Scripture and supremely
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  through the sun. OK, let's start with Scripture.
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  We see Jesus in John's Gospel, debating the religious leaders
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  constantly. What was Jesus's view of the
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  Bible of his day, what we call the Old Testament?
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  He viewed it as the ultimate final authority.
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  In John chapter 10, verse 35, Jesus makes this staggering,
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  almost off the cuff statement. Scripture cannot be broken.
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  Yeah, not be broken. In all his debates, he never
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  appeals to popular opinion or tradition or feelings.
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  He rests his entire case on the written word.
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  He tells the Jews in John chapter 5, verse 39, that the
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  Scriptures testify of him. He says if they actually
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  believed Moses, meaning the first five books of the Bible,
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  they would believe him because Moses wrote about him.
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  That's such a strong connection. You can't say you love God's
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  Word and then turn around and reject God's Son who is the
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  subject of that word. Precisely for Jesus and for
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  John, they stand or fault together.
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  But then John takes it a massive step further.
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  He introduces Jesus not just as the one fulfilling Scripture,
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  but has the Logos, the Word itself.
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  The prologue to John's Gospel in the beginning was the Word.
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  It's probably one of the most famous passages in the entire
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  Bible. And it's the clearest, most
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  concise digest of John's entire theology.
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  OK, he compares the revelation that came through Moses to the
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  revelation that is Jesus. The law, he says, came through
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  Moses, but grace and truth came through Jesus Christ.
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  And then in verse 18 of that first chapter, we get this
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  incredible Greek term. John says that Jesus has
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  explained the Father. The word is exegesado.
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  Exegesado. That sounds like exegete, like
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  what a pastor does when he explains a text.
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  That is exactly the root. Jesus is the living exegesis of
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  the invisible God. We don't have to guess what God
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  is like. We don't have to speculate or
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  project our own ideas onto him. Jesus explains him.
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  If you want to know the Father's heart, His character, his
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  nature, you look at the Son. He is the full, final and
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  perfect explanation. That's why the Incarnation is so
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  central to everything. It's not just a biological
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  miracle, it's a communicational miracle.
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  God is speaking in a language we can see and hear and touch.
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  And this leads us directly into what theologians call High
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  Christology. John does not pull any punches
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  about who Jesus is. No, he does not.
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  In the synoptic Gospels, the divinity of Christ sort of
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  unfolds gradually. The disciples slowly figure it
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  out. In John, it's there.
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  From the very first verse, the Word was with God, and the Word
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  was God. No ambiguity there.
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  None. Take his concept of light.
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  John says Jesus is the light. He isn't just a reflector of
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  light like Moses whose face shone.
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  He is the source of the light. This equates Jesus directly with
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  the Father, who is called my light and my salvation in Psalm
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  27. So if Jesus is the light, what
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  does that say about the world? What's the implication?
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  The. Implication is that the world is
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  in total, absolute darkness. That is the stark binary we
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  spoke of earlier. There is no middle ground, no
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  Gray area. To reject Jesus is to choose to
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  remain in darkness. And then there's the concept of
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  life. This is another huge one for
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  John. He says Jesus has life in
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  himself. That is a direct claim to what
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  theologians call a Sadie or self existence.
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  You and I, the trees outside, the angels in heaven, we all
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  have derived life. Our life is a gift.
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  It depends on God for its existence every single moment.
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  But John says Jesus has life in himself, just as the Father has
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  life in himself. He is the uncreated source of
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  all life. He gives eternal life, abundant
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  life, resurrected life. He cannot possibly be a created
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  being if he is the very source of all life.
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  And the religious leaders of the day, they certainly understood
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  what he was saying. They didn't think he was just
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  being poetic or metaphorical. Not for a second, when he called
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  himself the Son of God, they immediately picked up stones to
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  kill him. John 5.1 and tells us exactly
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  why they wanted to kill him, because he was not only breaking
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  the Sabbath, but also calling God his own father, making
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  himself equal with God. Making himself equal with.
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  To a strict monotheistic Jew, that was the ultimate blasphemy.
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  Unless, of course, it was true. And he didn't just take the
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  title, he claimed the prerogatives of deity, didn't
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  he? Yes, all of them.
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  He claimed the power to raise the dead, just as the Father
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  does. He claimed the right to judge
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  all humanity. He claimed the ability to answer
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  prayer made in his name, and he demanded honor equal to the
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  honor given to the Father. He says if you don't honor the
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  Son, you don't honor the Father who sent him.
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  It's a package deal. An absolute package deal.
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  Now there's another title Jesus uses frequently in John, and
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  that's Son of Man. I think some of these people
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  hear Son of God and think deity, and then they hear Son of Man
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  and they just think humanity. But it's much more complex than
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  that. It is much more substantial than
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  that. The title is derived directly
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  from Daniel Chapter 7 verse 13. OK.
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  In Daniel's vision, he sees one like a Son of Man, coming on the
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  clouds of heaven to approach the Ancient of Days and receive a
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  Kingdom that will never be destroyed.
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  So it was a title of divine royalty.
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  It is so when Jesus uses that title for himself, he is
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  claiming that heavenly authority.
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  He is claiming to be that prophesied king, but uniquely,
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  he infuses that title with the idea of suffering.
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  He is the king who will be lifted up.
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  And he means that in two ways. Lifted up on a throne and lifted
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  up on a cross. Exactly.
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  He is the divine King who must suffer as a human to inaugurate
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  his Kingdom. It bridges the gap perfectly.
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  OK, so you mentioned the world earlier and how the world's in
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  darkness. John uses that word cosmos a
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  lot. I think the note said 78 times
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  in the gospel alone. That's right.
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  Compare that to only 15 times and all the synoptic gospels
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  combine. But we have to define cosmos
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  very carefully, right? He is not usually talking about
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  the planet or nature or the created order.
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  He's talking about the world system.
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  The world system. So it's a moral category, not a
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  geographical. One, that's the perfect way to
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  put it. It is humanity organized and
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  rebellion against and independence from God.
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  It's the system of values, ambitions and beliefs that is
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  hostile to God. And John describes this world as
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  being actively hostile. It hates the light.
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  Why? Because the light exposes its
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  evil deeds. Don 3 is very clear.
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  People love the darkness rather than the light because their
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  deeds are evil. So the root sin of the world for
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  John isn't just, you know, lying or stealing.
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  No, the root sin is unbelief. It is the fundamental refusal to
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  come to the light to believe in Jesus.
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  In John 16, Jesus says the Holy Spirit will convict the world of
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  sin because they do not believe in me.
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  That's the core issue. And behind this world system
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  there is a ruler, a personality. Yes, Satan.
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  John's Gospel is very clear on this.
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  Jesus calls the devil the ruler of this world in John chapter 8
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  verse 44. In one of those intense
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  dialogues in the Bible, Jesus tells the religious leaders that
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  they are of their father, the devil.
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  That's an incredible thing to say to the religious
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  establishment. It is, and he says you want to
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  do your father's desires. What are those?
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  Murder and lying. The devil was a murderer from
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  the beginning, and he is the father of lies.
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  Jesus, by contrast, is the way, the truth and the life.
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  So it's this incredibly stark contrast.
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  You're either a child of God walking in truth and light, or
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  you were a child of the devil operating in lies and darkness.
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  That is the Yohanian dualism. There is no third category,
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  There is no neutral ground. But the good news, the whole
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  point of the gospel is that Jesus came to destroy the works
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  of the devil. He came to break that dominion.
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  And how did he do that? That brings us, I think, to the
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  Atonement, the solution to the darkness and the scent of the
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  world. Right.
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  John frames the atonement primarily in terms of prophetic
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  fulfillment, and the central image he uses is the Lamb.
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  You can trace this imagery all through the old custom, and it
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  starts with Abraham and Isaac on Mount Moriah.
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  God will provide for himself the Lamb.
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  It moves to the Passover lamb in Exodus, whose blood protected
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  Israel from the Angel of death. Then you have Isaiah 53.
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  The suffering Servant, depicted as a lamb led to the slaughter
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  for our iniquities. And then, after centuries of
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  waiting, John the Baptist sees Jesus coming toward him, points
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  his finger and says. Behold the Lamb of God who takes
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  away the sin of the world. It is the dramatic climax of
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  centuries of expectation. This is Him.
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  This is the one. And John is very careful to
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  emphasize that this death was vicarious.
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  It was a substitution, wasn't it?
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  Absolutely. He consistently uses the Greek
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  preposition hopper, which means for or on behalf of or in place
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  of. He gave his life for the sheep.
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  He died for the nation. It wasn't just a tragic
• 18:54
  martyrdom, it was a substitutionary transaction and
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  that. Transaction leads us to one of
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  the most powerful and maybe one of the most misunderstood words
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  in the entire Bible, Tetlesti. It is finished.
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  John 19 verse 30. Jesus cries this out from the
• 19:10
  cross, and you have to understand the grammar here.
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  It's a verb in the perfect tense.
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  OK, what does that mean for us? It means it doesn't just say I
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  am finished as in I am defeated or I am dying.
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  It means the work stands finished with ongoing permanent
• 19:24
  results. So it's a declaration of
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  victory. A total victory.
• 19:27
  The debt is paid in full. The plan of salvation is
• 19:30
  complete. The results are permanent.
• 19:31
  It is done. There's nothing left for us to
• 19:33
  add to it. Nothing whatsoever.
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  In fact, if you try to add your works, your goodness, your
• 19:38
  religion, to Tedelestai, you are effectively saying Jesus is a
• 19:41
  liar, that it wasn't actually finished after all.
• 19:44
  That's a powerful thought. Now in his first epistle, John
• 19:47
  adds 2 more sort of legal terms to help us understand the
• 19:51
  Salvation Advocate and propitiation.
• 19:54
  Yes, this is in first John chapter 2 verses one and two.
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  It's so helpful. He calls Jesus our paracletos,
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  our advocate. An advocate like a lawyer.
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  Exactly. The word refers to a defense
• 20:05
  attorney, He says when a believer sins, we have a defense
• 20:09
  lawyer standing before the Father in the courtroom of
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  heaven. But his defense is not what we
• 20:14
  might expect. He doesn't argue that we're
• 20:16
  innocent. He can't, because we're not.
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  Instead, he pleads his own blood.
• 20:20
  He points to the cross. He points to the propitiation.
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  Propitiation. That's a word we don't use much
• 20:26
  anymore. No, but it's vital.
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  The Greek is hellasmos. It means satisfaction.
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  It means the holy wrath of God, which was rightly due to us
• 20:33
  because of our sin, has been fully and completely satisfied
• 20:37
  by the death of Christ. So God is not just ignoring sin
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  or sweeping it under the rug. He is dealing with it legally
• 20:43
  and fully so that his justice is satisfied, which allows his
• 20:47
  mercy to flow. That's it exactly.
• 20:49
  It's a God word act. The cross satisfies God's own
• 20:51
  character. Now I want to ask about a phrase
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  in that passage that often causes confusion.
• 20:57
  It says he is the propitiation for our sins and also for those
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  of the whole world. How should we understand that?
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  That is an important verse that requires careful thought.
• 21:09
  The best way to understand it, consistent with John's entire
• 21:11
  theology, is that the provision of the Atonement is sufficient
• 21:14
  for the whole world. Sufficient for everyone.
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  Yes, because Jesus is the infinite God man.
• 21:20
  His death has infinite value. It is enough to cover the sins
• 21:24
  of every person who has ever lived.
• 21:26
  It is available to all, but it is only effectual or applied to
• 21:31
  those who believe. The provision is there for the
• 21:33
  whole world, but it is only received through faith.
• 21:36
  So the offer is universal, but the application is particular to
• 21:39
  the believer. That makes a lot of sense.
• 21:41
  It means he's the infinite worth of Christ's sacrifice while
• 21:44
  upholding the necessity of belief that John stresses
• 21:46
  everywhere else. Right.
• 21:48
  And of course, the atonement is not the end of the story.
• 21:50
  We have the resurrection. John gives us that vivid
• 21:53
  personal eyewitness account. I love the details John provides
• 21:56
  in chapter 20, he and Peter racing to the tomb.
• 22:00
  John outruns Peter, probably because he was younger, but he
• 22:03
  gets to the entrance and he hesitates.
• 22:05
  He just looks in. And then Peter being Peter.
• 22:08
  Peter, being Peter, just charges right in, but then John follows
• 22:12
  him and he sees something that makes him believe immediately
• 22:16
  before he's even seen the risen Lord.
• 22:19
  The the linen wrappings, yes. They were lying there, but they
• 22:22
  still retain the shape of the body, as if the body had just
• 22:25
  deflated. But the body was gone and the
• 22:28
  face cloth, the sudarium, was rolled up neatly by itself in a
• 22:31
  separate place. And what is the significance of
• 22:33
  that? Think about it.
• 22:35
  If grave robbers had stolen the body, would they have taken the
• 22:38
  time to carefully unwrap it and leave the linens in perfect
• 22:41
  order? No way.
• 22:43
  John realized in that instant that the body had passed right
• 22:46
  through the clothes he saw, and he believed.
• 22:48
  The resurrection vindicates everything Jesus claimed.
• 22:51
  It's the ultimate proof that he has life in himself.
• 22:53
  It is God the Father's Amen to the sons.
• 22:56
  It is finished. So Jesus returns to the Father,
• 22:59
  but he doesn't leave the disciples alone.
• 23:02
  This brings us to pneumatology, the doctrine of the Holy Spirit.
• 23:05
  And here again, John's Gospel is key.
• 23:07
  He gives us the most detailed teaching on the person and work
• 23:10
  of the Spirit in the entire Testament, specifically in the
• 23:13
  Upper Room Discourse, chapters 14 through 16.
• 23:16
  And the first thing that really stands out is how Jesus talks
• 23:18
  about the Spirit. He uses a specific pronoun.
• 23:21
  He does. He uses the masculine pronoun
• 23:23
  akinus. He know what's fascinating is
• 23:26
  that grammatically, the Greek word for spirit, numa is neuter.
• 23:31
  So the grammatically correct pronoun would be it.
• 23:33
  But Jesus deliberately breaks the grammar rules.
• 23:36
  He deliberately breaks the rules of grammar to make a theological
• 23:39
  point. The Holy Spirit is not a force.
• 23:41
  He is not an it. He's not like electricity or
• 23:44
  some kind of Star Wars energy. He is a person.
• 23:46
  He is a person. He teaches, he guides, he
• 23:48
  witnesses, he convicts, he can be grieved.
• 23:51
  You can't have a personal relationship with an impersonal
• 23:54
  force. And what is his work?
• 23:56
  Jesus describes him almost like a a prosecutor in a courtroom.
• 23:59
  Yes, that's a great analogy. The word for convict is Alexi.
• 24:04
  It's a legal term that means to cross examine and prove guilt.
• 24:07
  The Spirit acts as a prosecuting attorney against the world, and
• 24:10
  he proves the world guilty on three specific counts.
• 24:14
  First of sin. And Jesus defines that sin
• 24:17
  specifically as the sin of unbelief in him.
• 24:20
  Second, he convicts the world of righteousness, vindicating
• 24:24
  Jesus, preving He was righteous because he went back to the
• 24:26
  Father, and 3rd of judgment because the ruler of this world,
• 24:30
  Satan, has already been judged and condemned at the cross.
• 24:34
  And the spirit also has a role for the believer, right?
• 24:36
  He is the teacher. He is Jesus says the Spirit will
• 24:39
  teach them all things and crucially, will bring to your
• 24:43
  remembrance all that I said to you.
• 24:44
  That's a. Huge guarantee for us.
• 24:46
  It's the basis for our trust in the Gospels.
• 24:48
  The disciples didn't have tape recorders.
• 24:51
  The Holy Spirit supernaturally enabled their recall.
• 24:53
  So that the scripture we have today is accurate and
• 24:56
  trustworthy. And he endwells us.
• 24:57
  That was a completely new thing, wasn't it?
• 25:00
  In the Old Testament, the Spirit's relationship was
• 25:02
  different. It was revolutionary.
• 25:04
  In the Old Testament, the Spirit came upon people, often
• 25:06
  temporarily, for a specific service like prophecy or
• 25:09
  leadership. But Jesus promised something
• 25:12
  new. He said the Spirit would be in
• 25:13
  them and would be with them forever.
• 25:16
  It's a permanent personal indwelling union.
• 25:19
  That is such a comfort. We are never alone, OK?
• 25:23
  We are heading toward the end of our deep dive, which means we
• 25:25
  have to talk about the end of the world eschatology.
• 25:29
  John wrote the book on it literally.
• 25:31
  He certainly did, but even before we get to Revelation in
• 25:34
  John chapter 14, we get the first clear promise of what we
• 25:37
  call the Rapture. I go to prepare a place for you.
• 25:40
  Exactly. And if I go and prepare a place
• 25:42
  for you, I will come again and receive you to myself, that
• 25:45
  where I am, there you may be also.
• 25:48
  This parallels Paul's teaching in First Thessalonians chapter
• 25:50
  4. Jesus intends to come back
• 25:52
  personally to take his church to the Father's house.
• 25:55
  But then, after the Church is removed, we have the
• 25:57
  tribulation, which is laid out in graphic detail in Revelation
• 26:01
  chapter 6 through 19. It is a period of horrifying
• 26:05
  judgment. It is the final systematic
• 26:07
  dismantling of the Cosmos system we talked about earlier.
• 26:10
  John describes 3 Series of seven judgments, the seals, the
• 26:15
  Trumpets, and the bulls. And it reads like a crescendo of
• 26:18
  catastrophe, each series getting worse than the last.
• 26:21
  It is the seals bring the Antichrist on a White Horse,
• 26:25
  followed by war, famine and death on a global scale.
• 26:29
  And the trumpets. The trumpets bring about
• 26:31
  ecological collapse. 1/3 of the earth burned, 1/3 of the sea
• 26:35
  life dies. The fresh water is poisoned, he
• 26:38
  calls it Wormwood. Sunlight is diminished and
• 26:41
  demonic torments are unleashed on mankind.
• 26:44
  It's just terrifying to read. And then the bowls are the final
• 26:47
  outpouring of God's wrath. Yes, the seven last plagues,
• 26:50
  painful sores, all the seas and rivers turning to blood, the sun
• 26:54
  scorching people with fire, darkness and a massive
• 26:56
  earthquake that destroys the cities of the nations.
• 26:59
  Now, you mentioned the Antichrist.
• 27:00
  John is actually the only New Testament writer who uses that
• 27:03
  specific word, right? That is correct.
• 27:05
  In his epistles he defines Antichrist theologically.
• 27:09
  He says the spirit of Antichrist is what denies the incarnation,
• 27:12
  denies that Jesus Christ has come in the flesh.
• 27:15
  So it was an early form of Gnosticism.
• 27:17
  Exactly. But in Revelation he describes
• 27:20
  the ultimate final embodiment of that spirit.
• 27:22
  He calls him the Beast. This is the final world
• 27:25
  political ruler. Yes, he is empowered directly by
• 27:29
  Satan the Dragon, He's supported by a religious figure called the
• 27:33
  False Prophet, and he establishes total control over
• 27:36
  the world economy through the Mark of the Beast.
• 27:39
  It's the final, desperate attempt of the world system to
• 27:43
  organize itself against God. But it does not work.
• 27:46
  No, it ends with the second coming of Christ.
• 27:49
  And the Jesus we see in Revelation chapter 19 is not the
• 27:52
  gentle teacher by the seaside. He is a warrior king.
• 27:55
  His eyes are a flame of fire, he has a sword coming out of his
• 27:58
  mouth, and his robe is dipped in blood.
• 28:01
  He returns to judge and to wage war.
• 28:03
  He defeats the Beast and the False Prophet and casts them
• 28:05
  alive into the Lake of Fire. And then what happens after that
• 28:09
  great battle? Then Satan himself is bound and
• 28:11
  thrown into an abyss for 1000 years.
• 28:13
  This is the Millennium. A literal 1000 year Kingdom on
• 28:16
  earth. A literal Kingdom on this earth
• 28:18
  where Christ reigns from Jerusalem and the Saints, those
• 28:22
  from the Church age who were raptured, and those who were
• 28:25
  martyred in the Tribulation, and the Old Testament Saints are
• 28:28
  raised in what John calls the first resurrection to reign with
• 28:31
  him. And finally, after the
• 28:33
  Millennium and the final judgement, we have the eternal
• 28:35
  state, the New Jerusalem. It's the ultimate fulfillment of
• 28:39
  John 14, the city that Jesus went to prepare.
• 28:43
  It comes down from heaven to a new earth and.
• 28:45
  What's it like? No more tears, no more death, no
• 28:48
  more pain. But notice, it is not a place of
• 28:50
  idle rest. It's not just sitting on Clyde's
• 28:52
  playing harps. It's a place of meaningful
• 28:54
  service. His bond servants will serve
• 28:56
  him. It is a return to the purpose of
• 28:58
  Udin, but better. It is perfect unhindered
• 29:01
  fellowship with God, seeing his face.
• 29:03
  That is a truly breathtaking arc.
• 29:05
  We have gone from the Word, who is with God in the very
• 29:07
  beginning, to the Word made flesh dwelling among us, to the
• 29:11
  Lamb slain for the sin of the world, to the coming warrior
• 29:14
  king. It is the complete picture.
• 29:16
  John forces us to lift our eyes. You simply cannot have a small
• 29:20
  domesticated view of Jesus after reading John.
• 29:23
  It really forces a decision, doesn't it?
• 29:25
  John's witnesses presented almost like a courtroom
• 29:27
  testimony. He is saying, I saw this, I
• 29:30
  touched him with my hands, I heard him with my ears.
• 29:33
  And now the question is on us. Is he the light or do we prefer
• 29:37
  the darkness? And that connects directly back
• 29:40
  to John's concept of belief in our culture.
• 29:42
  Belief can be a very passive, intellectual thing, You know,
• 29:46
  like believing it might rain tomorrow.
• 29:48
  Right. Doesn't cost you anything.
• 29:49
  It doesn't. But for John, belief is an act
• 29:52
  of reliance. It is a commitment.
• 29:55
  It is resting your entire weight, your entire hope for
• 29:58
  eternity on the Tetaleste, the finished work of the sun.
• 30:02
  It's trusting that his life is the only true life there is.
• 30:06
  That's the challenge for all of us this week.
• 30:08
  Here's the thought I want to leave you with this sort of Mull
• 30:10
  over. We just talked about the New
• 30:12
  Jerusalem being a place of service and worship.
• 30:15
  We often think of heaven as this kind of permanent vacation or
• 30:18
  retirement. But if it is a place of active,
• 30:21
  joyful service and worship, how does our work and our worship
• 30:24
  right now prepare us for that eternity?
• 30:26
  That is a very profound question.
• 30:28
  Are we living now as citizens of that future city?
• 30:32
  Is our service here a dress rehearsal for our service there?
• 30:36
  Something to chew on. Thank you so much for joining us
• 30:39
  for this deep dive into the theology of John.
• 30:41
  It has been a pleasure. It's a wonderful topic.
• 30:43
  We will see you next time on reformed thinking.