Participants: Deyvy Rodriguez & Jon Paulien
Series Code: JBOTB
Program Code: JBOTB00003B
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00:01 And welcome back,
00:02 we are studying the Gospel of John 00:04 and we are with Dr. Jon Paulien. 00:05 Dr. Jon Paulien, we are-- 00:08 we were talking about the unique features of the Gospel of John. 00:12 Tell us more about those? Yeah. 00:15 Yeah, Gospel of John does a lot of things 00:17 that none of the other gospels do. 00:19 For example, in the Gospel of John 00:22 Jesus is much more assertive. 00:26 He really gets on people sometimes. 00:29 He could even be combative 00:31 kind of sarcastic at times 00:33 which is not what you would expect from Jesus 00:36 in Matthew, Mark and Luke. 00:37 So the Jesus portrayed in John 00:39 is quite a bit different in personality from the others. 00:42 You might say, well, you know why is that the case? 00:45 Well, if Jesus is representing God to us, 00:48 He might just be little bit bigger 00:51 than any of our own personalities. 00:53 But for example, in chapter 844 00:56 he calls people "Sons of the devil." 00:59 If I would have say that to you and really mean it, 01:02 you know, wow, 01:04 you son of a devil, you, you know, it's kind of-- 01:07 you would hope I was joking, you see. 01:09 So Jesus is very serious when He says that. 01:12 And another one, I remember in Chapter 10. 01:17 They're mad at Jesus and they are picking up stones 01:20 to throw at Him and he says, "Time out." 01:22 He says, "You're about to stone Me, 01:24 but I've a question. 01:26 For which of My good works are you stoning me?" 01:29 You see, now that's funny. 01:30 You know, you'd stop and think about it. 01:32 So Jesus is very assertive. 01:34 I mean, He instead of disappearing 01:36 like He would in Luke, He starts, 01:39 you know, challenging His stoners. 01:43 What they are doing here. 01:46 You've got narratives in the Gospel of John 01:48 that are nowhere else, Nicodemus, 01:50 the Samaritan woman for example, 01:52 the Lazarus story, these are not found, 01:57 you know, the tomb of Lazarus, 01:58 and so these are not found in any other gospel. 02:02 Often in Matthew, Mark and Luke there are three party dialogues, 02:07 where you have Jesus talking with two other people 02:10 or two groups or something and it's going back and forth. 02:14 In the Gospel of John it's always one on one. 02:17 And He will speak to one person 02:19 and then He will speak to another 02:20 and so on, so that's a difference. 02:24 I mentioned in an earlier program 02:26 that John doesn't have parables. 02:29 You know, like sower goes out to sow 02:32 and he puts out the grain and some other grain does well 02:35 and some gets choked out and, you know, so on. 02:38 Doesn't do parables, 02:39 the closest thing to a parable would be divine and the branches 02:43 or maybe the good shepherd, but those are analogies, 02:47 they are not really parables. 02:49 So in John the stories themselves become parables 02:52 and we'll see how that works in future programs. 02:56 In the Gospel of John, Jesus is not a teacher. 02:59 He doesn't talk for chapters long. 03:03 He simply acts and His sayings are short and clipped and so on. 03:08 And one more thing He said, in the Gospel of John 03:11 Jesus repeatedly visits Jerusalem, 03:14 where as in Matthew, Mark and Luke, 03:17 His main visit to Jerusalem is really the only one. 03:20 In Luke, He visits as a child, 03:23 but in His ministry-- He does His ministry in Galilee 03:27 and then comes to Jerusalem. 03:28 So John is sharing a bunch of earlier visits to Jerusalem 03:32 that aren't mentioned in the others. 03:34 So when we look at John uniquely there's a whole lot here 03:38 that we want to pay attention to. 03:40 And one of the most exciting 03:44 features of the gospel is the narrator. 03:48 You know, you noticed that sometimes in stories 03:50 there's a narrator who breaks in and he says, 03:52 "This is what was going on," you know. 03:56 Morally he was dead or whatever. 03:57 And so there's a narrator in the Gospel of John. 04:01 Let's get acquainted with it. Sure. 04:02 It's in Chapter 1 and you'll find him 04:05 all the way through the gospel, but Chapter 1 verse 38. 04:14 John 1:38, why don't you read that? 04:17 "Then Jesus turned and seeing them following, 04:20 He said to them, "What do you seek?" 04:22 They said to Him, "Rabbi" 04:24 which is to say when translated Teacher, 04:26 "where are You staying?" Okay. 04:29 Where's the narrator there? When-- 04:34 He's interpreting Rabbi, see, right in it. 04:37 Here, Rabbi, where are you staying? 04:38 He interrupts that. 04:40 So obviously Jesus did not say that. 04:41 Jesus didn't say. 04:43 You know, Rabbi, which is interpreted being teacher. 04:45 Where are you staying? 04:46 No, the people didn't say that. 04:48 That's the narrator inserting, why? 04:50 Because the reader may not understand that term. 04:53 So the narrator steps in 04:55 and he tells the information that they didn't know. 04:59 Look at verse 39. 05:01 "He said to them, "Come, and see." 05:04 They came and saw where he was staying, 05:05 and remained with him that day. 05:07 It was about the tenth hour. Okay. 05:10 You know my Bible has parenthesis. 05:12 For the tenth hour there? 05:13 That one and also the previous one, 05:15 which is to say when translated teacher. Yeah. 05:17 You see, so the translator there is recognizing 05:21 that there is something else going on here. 05:22 It's not part of the dialogue. 05:24 Yeah, it's not part of the dialogue, exactly. 05:26 So Gospel of John has this feature 05:29 constantly jumping in there. 05:32 You know, well, it was about the tenth hour. 05:34 Explaining stuff that the reader needs to know 05:37 to fully understand what is happening here. 05:40 Go to verse 41. 05:42 "And he brought him to Jesus. 05:44 Now when Jesus looked at him, 05:46 he said, you are Simon the son of Jonah 05:49 and shall be called Cephas, which is translated, a stone." 05:53 Which again we see the parenthesis in my version. 05:56 That's right. That's right. 05:57 So he's interpreting what that means, okay. 06:02 So there you see how the narrator 06:05 kind of inserts himself. 06:07 And it's interesting about this narrator. 06:09 First of all he knows everything. 06:12 The narrator knows what characters thought, 06:15 what they felt, what they intended to do. 06:19 You know, he knows what Judas is thinking at the supper table. 06:23 He knows what the disciples are thinking about Judas 06:26 and all this, narrator keeps plugging it in. 06:30 He can be everywhere. 06:33 He's there with Jesus and the Samaritan woman. 06:37 But then the disciples show up 06:39 and the Samaritan woman goes to town. 06:41 Narrator follows her to town 06:43 and at the same time he knows 06:45 what Jesus and the disciples are talking about with each other. 06:48 So the narrator can know, knows everything. 06:51 And the narrator can go anywhere 06:54 and he also knows what's in the future. 07:00 There are several times in the gospel where it says, 07:03 you know, they did this and so and he says, 07:04 but they didn't really understand at this time, 07:07 because the Holy Spirit hadn't come yet. 07:09 So the narrator jumps in and he says, 07:11 these guys are kind of dumb right now, 07:13 but they're gonna get smart later on. 07:14 So he knows the future of what's going on in the story. 07:18 So lot of people-- 07:20 So he's kind of helping the reader understand. 07:23 You know, you probably don't know what I mean by this, 07:27 but this is what it really means. 07:29 And so that's, that's helpful. Yeah. 07:32 And since you watch for the narrator as you go through 07:35 and the narrator gives you the information that you need. 07:39 And one thing you'll notice is the narrator is always right. 07:44 Because-- And you know he's right 07:46 because what he is saying 07:47 connects with everything else you know about the situation. 07:50 Through the narrator you know stuff 07:53 that the people in the story don't know. 07:56 So it's like inside information. 07:58 And he knows it because he was there. Yeah. 08:00 He saw it. Yeah. 08:02 So in one sense, I would say 08:03 the narrator sounds to me like the Holy Spirit, 08:06 providing he is-- John is illustrating 08:09 how through the Holy Spirit that extra information 08:13 comes where everything make sense. 08:15 You know, about Christian faith. 08:18 It makes perfect sense to those who walk with Jesus. 08:21 To somebody who doesn't have that relationship, 08:23 it may make no sense at all. 08:25 And here you see why, 08:27 that when people are lacking in certain information, 08:31 they can't make the decision that they need to make. 08:34 And so the Holy Sprit is constantly trying 08:36 to bring us the information we need. 08:39 In the Gospel of John people are constantly 08:43 misunderstanding Jesus. 08:46 You know, that brings us back to that second generation thing. 08:49 We would like to think 08:51 that if we were there with Jesus personally 08:54 that, you know, we would follow Him. 08:57 Man, we'd be better off. 08:59 In the Gospel of John the people with Jesus 09:02 never seemed to get it, they don't understand. 09:05 Take a look at Chapter 14. 09:09 John Chapter 14 and verses 7 to 9. 09:17 "If you had known me, 09:18 you would have known my Father also. 09:21 And from now on you know him and have seen him. 09:24 Philip said to him, "Lord, show us the Father, 09:27 and it is sufficient for us. 09:29 Jesus said to him, I have been with you so long, 09:32 and yet you have not known me, Philip? 09:34 He who has seen Me has seen the Father, 09:37 so how can you say, 'Show us the Father?'" 09:41 You see there's a misunderstanding going on here. 09:44 Jesus makes a statement. 09:47 The disciples take Him literally, you know. 09:50 Jesus says, "I've shown you the Father." 09:54 Philip says, "No, You haven't." 09:57 And Jesus says, "Yes I have." 09:58 If you've seen Me, you've seen the Father. 10:03 So in this misunderstanding that's going on, 10:07 it highlights the fact 10:09 that the Gospel of John wants you to go deeper. 10:12 If you take the stories only on the surface 10:15 you will misunderstand. 10:17 And if you think that being with the physical Jesus 10:21 makes all the difference, 10:23 just take a look at those who are with him. 10:25 They never did get it. 10:26 Over and over in this gospel you have this, 10:30 you know, Jesus makes a statement, 10:31 they respond taking it literally 10:34 and then Jesus or the narrator responds once more. 10:39 For example in Chapter 8 you have the story 10:41 that before Abraham was, I am. 10:48 Well, you know, they were saying, 10:50 you are how old and you say you've seen Abraham? 10:53 You know, well, they did get it. 10:55 In what sense is Jesus seeing Abraham? 10:57 He's saying well, I was with Abraham 11:00 on the mountain there when he sacrificed Isaac. 11:03 I was there with him, you see. 11:06 But that doesn't make sense, 11:07 but that would make sense to the reader, why? 11:11 Why do you think it would make sense to the reader? 11:13 It would just somehow provide some kind of assistance. 11:21 Because the first chapter of the book is the prologue 11:24 and it tells us who Jesus is. 11:26 He was the Logos. He was with the Father. 11:31 He was equal with the Father 11:32 and he came down and was made flesh. 11:35 See the reader knows all that. 11:38 So in all of these stories 11:40 the reader knows the moment Jesus speaks. 11:43 The reader knows what He means, 11:46 but the disciples don't get it, 11:47 the Pharisees don't get it, 11:49 the Samaritan woman doesn't get it. 11:51 So what took the disciples several years 11:54 to understand what Jesus said, 11:55 immediately the reader will understand as he reads it. 12:00 So you and I can read it. Okay, that's what it meant. 12:02 It doesn't-- we don't have to spend, 12:03 you know, several years to know what Jesus was talking about. 12:07 And in a sense these misunderstandings 12:09 are teaching us how to understand this gospel. 12:14 Don't take the surface level, you will misunderstand. 12:18 When you go beneath the surface, 12:19 like divine and the branches the surface level is good. 12:23 You get the story of Jesus, there's a lot to learn there, 12:25 but when you go a little bit deeper, 12:27 it opens fresh windows, 12:29 exciting pathways into the gospel. 12:32 Well, Dr. Paulien, this is exciting to know more. 12:35 And I wish that as I read the Bible 12:37 that I allow the Holy Sprit 12:39 to help me to understand more. Me too. 12:41 And friends, I hope that you too as you read God's word, 12:44 you can understand by God's spirit. |
Revised 2014-12-17