His
Hour Was Come
I've said many times that if you
banished me to an island and gave me my choice of three Bible books, I
would take the Psalms (for a praise guide), Romans (for theological
clarity) and the Gospel of John (for a working knowledge of the
Christian faith). If I was given the choice of just one book, it would
be John's Gospel for the reason stated above.
The apostle John lived longer than
any other apostle and was the last of the original twelve to die. He
served as a leader in the Jerusalem church from 30-70 AD. He fled to
Ephesus in 70 AD as the Romans destroyed Jerusalem. He stayed in
Ephesus until 95 AD before being banished to Patmos. He wrote the
Gospel of John at Ephesus between 85-90 AD and wrote 1st, 2nd and 3rd
John between 90-94 AD. John is exiled to Patmos in 95-96 AD, where he
wrote Revelation. He returned to Ephesus in 96 AD, where he lived until
his death.
Chapters 13-17 of John's Gospel are
jammed packed with spiritual truth that Jesus gave to his disciples
within an hour of time on the eve of his death. It took only minutes to
deliver, but has served the church for two thousand years in matters of
kingdom dynamics and Christian service. While John wrote these words
fifty years after Jesus spoke them, he penned them as if they were
still fresh in his mind. Here is our text:
“Now
before the feast of the passover, when Jesus knew that his hour was
come that he should depart out of this world unto the Father, having
loved his own which were in the world, he loved them unto the end”
-- John 13:1.
On two previous occasions, John wrote
that Jesus' hour had “not yet come” (John 7:30; 8:20). Now he writes
that Jesus (1) knew his hour had come, and (2) represented a departure
out of the world unto the Father. John 13:1 represents John's record of
the beginning of that hour! In this one verse, John makes us aware of
the following concerning
Christ:
I. His SEASON
Scripture says the season
was “before the feast of the Passover." The Passover
marked the beginning of the Jewish year. A lamb without blemish spot
was set aside on the 10th day of the first month to be sacrificed on
thee 14th day. It means the Passover lamb spent 3 full days with the
family before being killed. Jesus, our Passover Lamb, spent 3 full
years in the company of his own, becoming ever so familiar to them,
before becoming their sin offering. It was personal! The operative
truth of the Passover was stated in these words:
“And
the blood shall be to you for a token upon the houses where ye are: and
when I see the blood, I will pass over you” -- Exodus
12:13
Jesus was the Passover Lamb. The
blood coursing through his arteries and veins would the next day be
shed for sinners. When the efficacy of that blood is applied to the
heart of a believer, God washes away his sins, passes him from death
unto life and redeems him from the curse of the law.
After the head of a Jewish household
killed the lamb and collected its blood for application to the door
posts, he did not discard the carcass. The lamb was roasted with fire
and consumed by the family with haste as they anticipated immediate
departure from Egypt. In like manner, Jesus our Passover Lamb is
consumed by the believer for the purpose of experiencing his life and
growing in grace! Beginning with the Passover is feast the feast of
Uneavened Bread. Jesus is the unleavened bread of life. The presence of
Jesus in the believer promotes an unleavened life of holiness unto the
Lord.
II. His MISSION
Jesus was ready to “depart
out of this world unto the Father.” John adds in 13:3 that Jesus knew
the Father had delivered all things into his hands, that he came FROM
God and went TO God.
This verse reiterates the unique
relationship between Father and Jesus regarding his mission—departing
from and returning to the Father. This reflects the nature of the
Godhead. Jesus is NOT the Father and the Father is NOT Jesus! They are
two distinct Persons, who, along with the Spirit of God, comprise the
Triune God of scripture. The ONE God of scripture exists eternally as
THREE Persons: the Father, the Son and the Holy Spirit. John would
later write:
“For
there are THREE that bear record in heaven, the Father, the Word, and
the Holy Ghost: and these THREE are ONE” – 1 John 5:7
This word about the mission of Jesus
is relevant today because no Bible doctrine has come under more fierce
attack than the deity of Jesus of Nazareth. If Jesus is God, as
scripture affirms, then the LORD of the OT must be Triune in his
essence, which the NT reveals and affirms. God the Father is YAHWEH.
Jesus of Nazareth is YAHWEH. The Holy Spirit is YAHWEH. The one God of
scripture exists eternally in Three Persons!
What was the ultimate mission of
Jesus? It was to bring a man into the Godhead! Our salvation would have
been impossible without a mediator BETWEEN God and man who was BOTH God
and man. The departure of Jesus to the Father was going to require a
few intermediate stops—his arrest and trial, his death on the cross,
his resurrection, his descent to Abraham's bosom to lead OT captives to
the Father, forty days of resurrection appearances and a
final ascension to the Father's right hand, where he will sit until
his enemies become his footstool. Mission accomplished!
There are several scriptures that
validate the success of his mission:
“For
there is one God, and one MEDIATOR between God and men, the MAN Christ
Jesus; Who gave himself a ransom for all, to be testified in due time”
– 1 Timothy 2:5-6
“Wherefore
then serveth the law? It was added because of transgressions, till the
SEED should come to whom the promise was made; and it was ordained by
angels in the hand of a mediator. Now a mediator is not a
mediator of one, but God is one” – Galatians 3:19-20
This is one of the most profound
passages in the NT. The “seed” of 3:19 is Jesus of Nazareth. The first
mediator mentioned is Moses, by whose hand God delivered his Law to
Israel. As a rule, the role of mediator requires two or more parties.
Moses did exactly that, representing God to Israel and Israel to God.
But when the Seed came, who was God in the flesh, GOD and the MEDIATOR
between God and man, the man Christ Jesus, became one! YAHWEH became
his own Mediator! The solution to the need for mediation bewteen God
and man is the God-Man, Jesus of Nazaretht! Nothing says “Mission
Accomplished” like this one from Hebrews:
“But
this MAN, after he had offered one sacrifice for sins for ever, sat
down on the right hand of God” – Hebrews 10:12
Perhaps there is no greater summation
of “Mission Accomplished” and the work of the Godhead in our salvation
than this text from Galatians:
“But
when the fulness of the time was come, GOD [the FATHER] sent forth his
SON [Jesus of Nazareth], made of a woman, made under the law, To redeem
them that were under the law, that we might receive the adoption of
sons. And because ye are sons, God hath sent forth the SPIRIT of his
Son into your hearts, crying, Abba, FATHER” – Galatians 4:4-6
Opponents of the Trinity and the
deity of Christ (you cannot deny one without denying the other) often
point to the Council of Nicaea in 325 AD as the place where Trinitarian
doctrine was concocted by one named Athanasius and his fellow church
bishops. They claim Athanasius, under pressure from Roman emperor
Constantine, invented the idea of a Triune god (or three gods) to
better meld the Christian faith with the multiplicity of Roman gods,
making it more acceptable to the masses.
This is a total misrepresentation of
the facts, an exercise in intellectual dishonesty. What Athanasius and
the Council did was combat the error of one Arius, who taught Jesus was
NOT God, but a created being. His heresy became known as the Arian
Controversy, or Arianism. The Council of Nicaea in 325 AD did nothing
more than affirm the deity of Christ and apostolic doctrine! If you had
been a member of the church at Ephesus circa 60 AD, where Paul spent
three years preaching and teaching the gospel he received from Jesus,
he would have taught you Trinitarian doctrine. Any attack on the
Trinity is an attack on Jesus himself. It is satanic! For if Jesus is
not God and the Godhead is not Triune, there is no mediation possible
for sinful men. Opponents of the Trinity are their own worst
enemies!
In summary, the apostolic doctrine of
the Godhead is One God, Three Persons (Father, Son and Holy Spirit).
The Council of Nicaea reaffirmed it. The opponents of Trinitarianism
insist on One God, One Person, Three Titles (Father, Son and Holy
Spirit). This is the rational approach to the Godhead. But we must
remember that Christianity is not RATIONAL, but REVELATIONAL!
These two great truths—the redeeming
blood of Jesus Christ and his equality with the Father—are
two fundamentals of the Christian faith. They are the reason
why Muslims has slaughtered an estimated 360 million Christians since
the time of the first Crusade in 1095 AD.
III. His COMPASSION
Scripture says that
Jesus, “having loved his own which were in the world, he loved
them unto the end.” The word “end” is telos, the terminal
point. The question is: The terminal point of what? The obvious answer
is the end of his earthly life at the Cross. But if the end in view is
his earthly ministry, it would include the forty days of
post-resurrection appearances prior to his ascension. And since Jesus
loved his own unto the end, we can find glimpses of the that love in
the Gospels, both prior to his death and after his resurrection. In the
interest of brevity, we'll cite only a handful.
One of the clearest is Peter walking
on the water in Matthew 14:28-31. When the disciples saw Jesus walking
on the water, they thought they saw a ghost. Peter sought proof,
asking: “Lord, if it's really you, bid me come to you.” Jesus said:
“Come!” It must be noted that Peter, in walking on the water, was
actually walking on the WORD! He was doing fine, operating in the realm
of the supernatural, until his focus was diverted from Jesus to the
wind and waves. As he began to sink, he cried out: “Lord, save me!”
Jesus stretched forth his hand and caught Peter.
Herein is the love of Jesus
displayed. When a believer dares to step out in faith and walk on the
word of Christ, he bids us walk in power. But when a believer is
overcome with doubt and finds himself sinking, the same Jesus has a
strong, outstretched arm to catch him when he sinks.
The scripture tells us Jesus and
Peter made it into the ship. What it does not tell us is how Peter got
back to the ship. There are only three options. Option #1:
Jesus caught Peter and dragged him through the choppy surf back to the
ship. Option #2:
Peter walked on water again as Jesus held his hand. Option #3:
At some point, Peter looked at Jesus, and said: “Lord, you can let go
now! I've got this!” and walked on water back to the ship with Jesus at
his side. When I get to heaven, I think I'll ask Peter which of those
three options was the case.
Much has been made of Peter and his
failure, walking on the water in faith and then sinking in doubt. But
for those fellow disciples who never envisioned themselves stepping out
of that ship, they might have later kicked themselves, saying: “Why
didn't we think of that?!”
The scripture is silent regarding the
distance of Jesus from the boat when the disciples first saw him and
Peter made his request. That's probably a good thing. If the text had
given us the exact or approximate distance, you can bet some church
somewhere would have given itself a name that included that distance,
such as 'Furlong Baptist Church' or something
similar.
The Feeding of the Five Thousand in
John 6:5-14 is another example. The Lord Jesus enlisted Philip to
assess the situation and devise a solution. Jesus already knew what he
was going to do. But he did not want to do it without involving his
own, making them participants or co-workers in the miraculous. These
men saw the supernatural first-hand, distributing bread and fish to the
masses and collecting (conserving) the fragments.
The love of Jesus for his own is
manifested every time he makes his disciples participants in the
miraculous distribution of bread! The bread of life is the gospel of
Jesus Christ and the Word of God. When a believer distributes the bread
of the gospel in evangelism, and the sinner receives that bread and is
born again, Jesus and the evangelist become co-participants in the
miraculous!
In Luke 23:34, as he hung on the
Cross, Jesus cried: “Father, forgive them, for they know not what they
do!” He clearly offered this petition on behalf of the Jews who cried
out for his death as well as the Romans who nailed him to the cross.
There's no doubt in my mind that it included those ten disciples who
abandoned him and were nowhere to be found. Only John was
present.
In Revelation 3:19, Jesus told the
Laodicean church that he rebukes and chastens those whom he loves. In
Mark 16:14, after the resurrection, Jesus “upbraided” his disciples for
their unbelief and hardness of heart. They had rejected the testimony
of other eyewitnesses in spite of the fact he told them beforehand what
would happen. Scripture says he appeared in their midst while they were
“sitting at meat.”
I wonder how the conversation was
going? I can hear one of them saying: “Well, guys, we had a good run!
But it's over now!” Another chimed in: “Yeah, you got that right!” In
essence he was saying: “Don't you guys realize what just happened? I've
atoned for the sins of the whole world, including yours! I bruised the
head of the Serpent just as I promised Eve! I've conquered death, your
worst enemy! I just laid the foundation for MY kingdom, for which I've
spent the last three years training YOU guys! Stop wallowing in
self-pity and start believing!”
In John 20:24-28, we have his
appearance to Thomas after the resurrection. When he first heard Jesus
was alive, he said: “Unless I place my fingers in his wounds, I will
not believe!” (20:25). Eight days later, Jesus appeared to the
disciples with Thomas present in order to deal with his doubts. It's as
if Jesus was saying: “Here are my wounds, son. I'm giving you exactly
what you said you needed. Are these scars going to be enough to resolve
your doubts?” Turns out sight without touch was enough for Thomas, as
he affirmed: “My Lord and my God!” (20:28). God has NEVER cut DEALS
with men. He's not in the deal-cutting business. But God has and does
honor VOWS (e.g., Gideon). In the case of Thomas, he made a VOW, and
Jesus gave Thomas the opportunity to make good on that vow!
Our last example is in John 21. Jesus
met with Peter and six other disciples on the sea of Galilee after
Peter had denied Jesus and said: “I go a fishing!” We know the story of
how they fished all night and caught nothing. Our Lord's instruction to
cast their nets on “the other side” of the ship netted 153 fish. Jesus
was teaching (or rather re-teaching) a critical spiritual truth: There
are NO GUARANTEES in life for a believer OUTSIDE the WILL OF
GOD! The love of Jesus for his own will ALWAYS give the wayward saint
the opportunity to reaffirm and reciprocate his love for Christ without
regard for how far he's drifted off the beaten path! Our Lord's
handling of Peter is confirmation the love of Jesus will NEVER let us
go!
When Shadrach, Meshach and Abednego
were cast into that fiery furnace, and in desperate need of
deliverance, Jesus became the FOURTH man IN the fire. When Peter and
six other disciples headed out on a fishing expedition, and in need of
restoration, Jesus became the EIGHTH man AT the fire. It is so
encouraging to know that whatever a believer needs, whether liberation
in the midst of persecution or restoration in the midst of dereliction,
the love of Jesus for his own is sufficient for both!
Yes, the love of Jesus for his own is
most
obvious right up until he ascended to the Father's right hand. But
according to Romans 8:38-39, that love for his own will NEVER end:
“For
I am persuaded, that neither
death, nor life, nor angels, nor principalities, nor powers, nor things
present, nor things to come, Nor height, nor depth, nor any other
creature, shall be able to separate us from the love of God, which is
in Christ Jesus our Lord.”
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