Lesson for April 14, 2021
The Life of Christ
Lesson 17
Jesus Answers the Pharisees Regarding His Deity
John 5:19-30
The Humility of Christ, Verses 19-21
Jesus was the exact image of the Father in His virtue and in His integrity. Christ always exhibited strength of character and never deviated from the truth. His life is the example for all believers. For Christ, humility meant placing Himself under the authority of God the Father. The doctrine of kenosis (restricting the use of His deity) also spoke of Christ’s humility. Christ was also teachable, which is a characteristic of a humble person. As a human being, Jesus had to learn about God by studying the Old Testament. Christ’s availability of divine truth was limited to what was available to everyone at the time He lived. This is the reason that Christ is the perfect prototype for the believer to follow.
What Christ was saying to the Pharisees in John 5:19 was that He was equal with God the Father, but He was also equal to them. The Pharisees, just like Christ, could have done “what they saw the Father do.” In their case, however, they would have had to become believers and would have had to have positive volition toward learning about God (neither was true of them).
In order to be an effective prototype, Christ could have access only what was available to all believers at the time in which He lived. The revelation of God’s plan for Jesus Christ and the human race had already been revealed in the Old Testament and was available for any believer to learn. Since Jesus had already performed miracles, miracles could not be the “greater works” of John 5:20. The greater works are actually revealed in the next verse. There was no recorded resuscitation of the dead in Scripture to this point that could have been witnessed by these religious leaders. John 5:21 tells us what these greater works will be – raising the dead and the resurrection of Jesus Christ. This verse also had added meaning in relation to spiritual death and being made alive spiritually by Christ.
Jesus Christ always declared that He was equal with God the Father in John 5:22. This assertion continually upset the religious unbelieving Jews. When Jesus made the statement that all judgment had been given to Him by the Father, He was making Himself equal with God. Jesus Christ is the Judge of all categories of judgment by God. He will judge (evaluate) believers at the Judgment Seat of Christ. He will judge unbelievers at the Great White Throne Judgment. He will also pronounce the carrying out of the final sentence against Satan and his demons being cast into the Lake of Fire.
John 5:23 further confirms that Jesus was saying He was equal with the Father. When a person gives honor to one member of the Godhead, he is giving honor to all members, the Father, the Son and the Holy Spirit, since they are co-equal and co-eternal. Christ was telling these skeptics that He had come directly from the Father, was sent by the Father and was co-equal with the Father. They simply refused to believe it.
In John 5:24, the fact that Jesus stated that His word was to be listened to parallels the idea that He had been sent by God to preach this message, and that by believing in the One Who sent Him a person was acknowledging the equality of the Father and the Son. Jesus reemphasized the fact that judgment was His to execute, but faith would negate spiritual death and give eternal life.
John 5:25 further deals with Christ giving eternal life, a gift that only God can give. “The dead” in this verse referred to the spiritually dead and “hearing His voice” was a reference to faith. This person will not only be made alive spiritually he will also participate in a resurrection of the physically dead by receiving a glorified body.
In John 5:26-28 Jesus was given the role of judge because He is the God-man, perfect humanity and deity in one Person. It is an amazing fact that the One Who will judge all mankind is the One Who paid the penalty for their sin and offers eternal life as a free gift. Who better to judge or evaluate mankind than the God-Man? Jesus said that the time was coming when a judgment would occur. He did not give them a specific date, but it was certain that a judgment would happen in the future for those listening to His voice.
Jesus now made a statement that can be understood only by an examination of the original Greek language. In English, Jesus seemed to be saying that by doing good deeds a person would have eternal life and a person who did evil deeds would not have eternal life. We know from other Scriptures that this was not what Jesus was teaching.
The phrase in John 5:28 “those who have done good” means the ones who did the intrinsic (eternal) good. Intrinsic good is good that has lasting value. The “ones” are those who have done “good of lasting (eternal) value” by believing in Christ as Savior. The phrase, “those who have done evil” means the ones who do the human good for salvation. Practicing human good is analogous to rejection of Jesus Christ in favor of human good works.
John 5:30 showed that Christ always followed the will of God the Father. God the Father was the planner, and Christ was the executer of the plan. Part of God’s plan was for Jesus Christ to be the Judge of all mankind. Since Jesus Christ is fully God, His judgments are always fair and just. The judicial decisions that were made and will be made in the future are all based on the integrity and virtue of God. God’s plan is always perfect.
God decreed as His plan for mankind that all believers in the Church Age would become Royal Family of God. This fact will never change during this age because God’s decrees never change, they are always certain. Therefore, as a believer in Christ you can be confident that when you believed in Christ you became royalty.
All of God’s decrees are given in order to bring honor and glory to Himself. All decrees regarding you as a believer are designed by God for your maximum happiness and His eternal glory. Since God knows all of our thoughts, decisions and actions, it only makes perfect, logical sense to allow Him to control them. By allowing God to control our thoughts, decisions and actions we are assured of the proper execution of His perfect plan for us.
Think for a moment about all that God has done to reach you, to provide the necessary tools for your happiness, think about His patience and love, His grace and His blessings in your life. Do you really think that God would provide something or someone for you that would make you miserable or unhappy or would not a part of His perfect plan for you? God has chosen every believer for a service. We know that this service is a reasonable service (it makes perfect sense – Romans 12:1-2). We know from the study of His Word what this service is, and we know how to accomplish it. We also know from Scripture the alternative to fulfilling God’s plan. The question is whether we will choose God’s plan or our own – happiness or self-induced misery.