78 - Exclusivity of Christianity

Exclusivity of Christianity; John 14:5-11

In this dialogue John is going to help us understand what it means to love as Jesus loved. We are going to see Jesus exemplify this to the disciples in this dialogue. Second, we will see the inadequacy of pre-church age knowledge. Remember, the church age was not instituted until the day of Pentecost in 33 AD. Prior to that time there is no indwelling of the Holy Spirit and no filling of the Holy Spirit, and so there is no internal dynamic to learn doctrine based upon the teaching ministry of God the Holy Spirit. What we see among the disciples is the same inadequate internal learning system for learning spiritual things that existed throughout the Old Testament. That is why so many sophisticated doctrines are not developed until the New Testament, because without the teaching of God the Holy Spirit they just couldn't understand it. They just don't get the point. They have been with Jesus over and over and over again for three years, have heard Him teach these things again and again, and it is just as if they haven't ever heard a word He has said. They just ask the most inane questions. What is going to happen in this dialogue is that Jesus is going to inform them that He is going to send a Comforter, another helper to be with them forever. It is part of the function of this Helper to teach them doctrine. One thing John is illustrating for us is the problem with learning spiritual truth prior to the cross and then the fact that after the cross when we have the Holy Spirit to indwell us, the fill us, to teach us, that we can understand these fantastic doctrines.

John 14:4 ^NASB  "And you know the way where I am going. [5] Thomas said to Him, 'Lord, we do not know where You are going, how do we know the way?' [6] Jesus said to him, 'I am the way, and the truth, and the life; no one comes to the Father but through Me'." In the construction in the Greek He makes the statement ego eimi [e)gw e)imi] and then He repeats the article and the conjunction in each one, so He is making three claims. He is saying, "I am the way, I am the truth, I am the life." He is making three distinct claims about His person. He is claiming that He is the only way to God, and furthermore, He is claiming not only to be the only way to the ultimate end but he is the ultimate end. He is the truth and He is the life. In Him, John said, was life and that life was the light of the world. So Jesus is making a profound claim about Himself here that He is not only the means to the end, He is to be identified with the end itself.

John 14:7 "If you had known Me, you would have known My Father also; from now on you know Him, and have seen Him." For "known" he uses the word ginosko [ginwskw] which indicates a progress of knowledge. It indicates a process of learning. As a teacher teaches we learn a line here, a line there, a little here, a little there, precept upon precept. Then oida [o)ida] indicates full knowledge. Jesus said: "If you had known me." By using the 1^st class condition He recognises that in the past they have had some knowledge but not full knowledge of Him. The perfect tense focuses on the current results of past action: "If you had known me fully in the past with results that go on you would have known my Father." What we are seeing here is one of the underlying themes, the strong affirmation of Jesus' deity and the teaching of the dynamics of the Trinity. He says that knowledge of Him is the same as knowing the Father.   

John 14:8 ^NASB "Philip said to Him, 'Lord, show us the Father, and it is enough for us'." He begins with the Greek word  deiknumi [deiknumi]. This isn't simply just show us or demonstrate for us, it is a much stronger word than that. It means to make known the character or significance of something through various visual, auditory, or linguistic means. But it goes beyond that, it has the idea in John's Gospel, because of its emphasis on the signs of Jesus' deity and the signs of His Messiahship it takes on the additional concept of to reveal or to disclose. So John uses dieknumi in a much more technical sense. So Philip is saying: "Reveal to us the Father." He is looking for some sort of manifestation of God. The word translated "enough" is the verb arkeo [a)rkew] which means to be completely satisfied and thus content. Philip is really asking for a theophany. A theophany always relates to the pre-incarnate Christ. It sounds like Philip may be asking a somewhat simple question but what he is really asking for is an appearance of the glory of God much like the glory of God that appeared to God on Mount Sinai or appeared to Isaiah in Isaiah chapter six. But what underlies Philip's question? He is wanting a manifestation of the glory of God and to know God in His fullest. Remember, Jesus has just said, "From now on you know Him and have seen Him," and this phrase to know God has eschatological significance. To the Jew, when he heard this, it immediately rang some bells related to Old Testament revelation. In the Old Testament it is said that God knows man, but rarely does it say that man knows God. So passages like the following reflect the limited knowledge that man has of God.

Jeremiah 9:23, 24 ^NASB "Thus says the LORD, 'Let not a wise man boast of his wisdom, and let not the mighty man boast of his might, let not a rich man boast of his riches; but let him who boasts boast of this, that he understands and knows Me, that I am the LORD who exercises lovingkindness, justice and righteousness on earth; for I delight in these things,' declares the LORD."

Notice by way of observation the mention of the three aspects of the integrity of God here: the love of God, chesed, along with His justice and His righteousness. The Lord says He delights in these things. But He says in v. 24 that the goal of our lives, what gives meaning and definition and value to our lives, and hence what makes us happy and gives us real contentment and tranquillity, is to know God—not simply to know about God, but we learn all these things about God because that drives us to a relationship with Him. It is not simply an accumulation of academic data from the Bible about God and who he is but that the goal for man is to know God.

God made a covenant with Abraham in Genesis chapter twelve that involved three promises: a land, a seed, and blessing. The Davidic covenant expands upon the second provision of the Abrahamic covenant. Then the blessing aspect of the Abrahamic covenant is further expanded in the New covenant. In the blessing provision in the Abrahamic covenant God said to Abraham: "Through you I will bless all nations." So it the blessing goes first to Abraham and all Jews and it proceeds through them then to all mankind. In the New covenant, every time it is mentioned God says: "I am making a new covenant with the house of Israel and the house of Judah." He never mentions the church as covenant partner. But just as God made a covenant with Abraham and through Abraham he would then bless all, God is making a new covenant with Israel as the covenant partner, and the by-product of that and through that all mankind is blessed. That comes about through the cross. So we, Paul says, become ministers of the new covenant because we are proclaiming the good news, the gospel, of reconciliation. That does not mean we are New covenant partners, we are not part of the contract. The New covenant does not come into effect for Israel until Jesus Christ returns at the Second Coming.

Jeremiah 31:33, 34 ^NASB "But this is the covenant which I will make with the house of Israel after those days [the Tribulation]," declares the LORD, "I will put My law within them [every single believer will know doctrine] and on their heart I will write it; and I will be their God, and they shall be My people. They will not teach again, each man his neighbor and each man his brother, saying, 'Know the LORD,' for they will all know Me, from the least of them to the greatest of them," declares the LORD, "for I will forgive their iniquity, and their sin I will remember no more."

So what is one of the characteristics of the Millennium? Every individual will have a full knowledge of God. So when we talk to a Jew about knowing God, guess what would come into their minds. New covenant kingdom promises that at the time when Messiah comes in His kingdom we will all know God. What has Jesus been doing? He has been proclaiming that the kingdom of God is at hand, and their question in Acts 1:5: "Lord, is it now that you are going to bring in the kingdom?" So we see that in the upper room there is still this confusion about the plan of God, they can't figure it out. What is the timetable? The underlying question is, is this the time of the kingdom? It is the same thing that Peter is asking: Where are you going? Why are you going? Isn't this the time? Philip is really concerned and can't figure this out, so he is asking all of these basic questions. In some sense he wants a preview of the Messianic kingdom, he wants to see this kind of thing taking place right now.

What are the implications of all of this? Jesus has just said that these men had been walking and talking and spending time with Him for three years, and he has said in v. 7 that knowing Him was equivalent to knowing the Father; that as far as man was concerned in time, as far as flesh and blood and material man was concerned, the revelation that they had of God in Him was the fullest that there ever could be. If you want to look at God you have to look at Jesus, there is no other way to do it. There is no additional revelation that can expand it. The fullest and highest and greatest revelation of the essence of God, who God is and what he is like, is in Jesus Christ. That revelation is complete for all time and all history. There is no need to add to it. What Jesus is saying is, I have given you the complete and final revelation of God and if you really want to know Him all you do is look at me, Philip, Thomas. They just can't get it, and John is showing the need for having the indwelling and the filling of the Holy Spirit.

The second implication of this is that not only is Jesus the highest revelation, not only is He the fullest expression of God in history, but this is a major correction to all Greek and Hebrew thinking. The Jews had been thinking chronologically that you can't really know God until the future. Jesus is saying you can have a full knowledge of God right now, it is incarnate before you. The Greeks thought you couldn't know God historically at all, that there was no such thing as a space-time representation of God, all they had was an ideal. That was the problem with Gnosticism.

The third implication here affects our attitude towards the Bible. The Bible is called the mind of Christ. It is the Word of Christ. How we respond to the Bible is identical to how we respond to God. What Jesus is saying is, if you look at me you are looking at the Father; if you listen to my words you are listening to the words of the Father. The Bible is the mid of Christ; how you respond to the mind of Christ is how you respond to God.   

 John 14:9 ^NASB "Jesus said to him, 'Have I been so long with you, and {yet} you have not come to know [ginwskw] Me, Philip? He who has seen Me has seen the Father; how {can} you say, 'Show us the Father'?" He has already said in v. 7 that to know Him is to know the Father. Now He says that to see Him is to see the Father. These are profound claims to deity. Philip had some academic knowledge that had not yet become epignosis [e)pignwsij] in his soul.

John 14:10 "Do you not believe that I am in the Father, and the Father is in Me?" Notice that the solution is faith. Faith is the presupposition of all knowledge. Jesus is saying that you have to start off with faith alone in the revelation of God. Jesus is claiming identical essence with the Father here. "The words that I say to you I do not speak on My own initiative, but the Father abiding in Me does His works." So we see the intimate association with the Father. 

John 14:11 ^NASB "Believe Me that I am in the Father and the Father is in Me; otherwise believe because of the works themselves."