Jean Paul Sartre, the French existentialist, anticipated the sense of aloneness people today are experiencing when he wrote, ‘That God does not exist, I cannot deny; That my whole being cries out for God, I cannot forget’.

I am not suggesting that we need to invent a god to calm our anxious thoughts. Rather, we need to be open to learning about the most remarkable man who ever lived.

Yes, it means making time in our busy lives to read and review our view of the world. It’s much simpler to follow along with the views of Stephen Hawking and others who deny the notion of a creator God and overlook the observations of other high-level scientists.

For example, Dr HF (Fritz) Schaefer, one of the world’s leading quantum chemists has made this comment about the late Stephen Hawking’s view of God. In A Brief History of Time Hawking wrote: ‘We are such insignificant creatures on a minor planet of a very average star in the outer suburb of one of a hundred billion galaxies. So it is difficult to believe in a God that could care about us or even notice our existence’.

In his book Science and Christianity: Conflict or Coherence? Schaefer writes: ‘My response to that statement by Hawking, and to others that have said this over the years, is that that’s a silly thing to say. There isn’t any evidence to date that life exists anywhere else in the universe. Human beings, thus far, appear to be the most advanced species in the universe. Maybe God does care about us! Where Hawking surveys the cosmos and concludes that man’s defining characteristic is obscurity, I consider the same data and conclude that humankind is very special’.

In chapter 6 of his account of the Jesus Story, the writer John records another sign pointing to the uniqueness of Jesus. Following his provision of enough food for a crowd of five thousand from five barley loaves and two fish, Jesus saw that the crowds were planning to make him king. He had therefore slipped away, alone back up into the mountain (6:15). The disciples had taken a boat without him, to cross the Sea of Galilee towards Capernaum some five miles away.

It was a night crossing and strong winds caused the waters to rise. This is something that often occurs here. The lake is six hundred feet below sea level and strong winds blow up from the south-eastern plains, causing the shallow waters to rise quite quickly.

When the disciples had rowed three or four miles they saw Jesus, walking on the sea and coming near the boat. John records they were frightened (6:19). “It is I” – literally, “I am”, Jesus assured them. “Do not be afraid” (6:20). Relieved, they took him into the boat.

It was another amazing event – Jesus, walking on water – pointing to someone who was truly human and yet who could act outside the laws of nature. It was either a lie that John, and Matthew (14:22-34) and Mark (6:45-52) had fabricated, or it is another event that exemplifies the observation of Dr. John Lennox that we have already noted: ‘From a theistic perspective, the laws of nature predict what is bound to happen if God does not intervene… To argue that the laws of nature make it impossible for us to believe in the existence of God and the likelihood of his intervention in the universe is plainly false’.

Having arrived in Capernaum, John records that the crowds again found Jesus. We read his cryptic comment: “Very truly, I tell you, you are looking for me, not because you saw signs, but because you ate your fill of the loaves. Do not work for the food that perishes, but for the food that endures for eternal life, which the Son of Man will give you (6:26-27).

‘What you have to realize,’ Jesus is saying, ‘is that there are two kinds of bread. The bread that sustains our physical bodies which one day will die, and another bread that sustains our spiritual existence: a life that will last forever’.

‘However,’ Jesus continues, ‘because you are focussed on the physical bread, you are materialists. You enjoyed the benefits of lunch in the open and were excited about it. But you missed the real meaning of what happened. You enjoyed the benefits of the miracle, but you didn’t see the sign.’

When he looked out on the crowd that day, Jesus didn’t just see people who were hungry for physical food, but people who were searching in vain for something to satisfy the spiritual vacuum in their hearts. He didn’t just see empty stomachs: he saw empty souls. The miracle of turning the loaves and fish into sufficient food to feed the crowd was a sign of his capacity to feed our deep spiritual hunger.

In the final analysis, material things cannot satisfy our deep longings. And so Jesus reminds us that we do not live by bread alone. Life is more than physical food.

Words such as these prompted people like Karl Marx to insist that religion is the opiate of the poor to keep them content with their lot. Jesus disagrees: materialism is a drug anaesthetizing men and women to the reality of spiritual things. True and lasting contentment, satisfying the depths of our souls, can’t be found in materialism.

Think how often we look for new clothes and the latest electronic gear. Our appetite for things is insatiable. No amount of physical ‘bread’ will satisfy our spiritual need.

Jean-Paul Sartre’s words referenced above, express our frustration with painful honesty.

The Teacher in The Book of Ecclesiastes says God has put eternity into our hearts. But Jesus alone claims to meet that spiritual longing. “I am the bread of life,” he says. ‘Anyone who comes to me will never go hungry. Anyone who believes in me will never be thirsty.’

It’s vital we see this. The story of Jesus and the signs he carried out, point to a greater reality about him and about us. He is the wholly good, all-powerful and compassionate Lord who has come among us to serve us. His words reveal that we are much more than the sum of our parts – our brain and heart, our body and our limbs. We are made for relationship – with our creator and with one another.

The bread Jesus offers awakens us to our deeper need – to feed on the one who can offer us life by restoring our relationship with God and learning to love one another. In him we find true hope for the future.

Prayer. Lord our God, fountain of all wisdom, you know our necessities before we ask and our ignorance in asking: have compassion on our infirmities; and those things which for our unworthiness we dare not and for our blindness we cannot ask, graciously give us for the worthiness of your Son, Jesus Christ our Lord. Amen.

© John G. Mason

There are many troubling issues around us today – the cost of living, the divisions in society, opioid and alcohol abuse, homelessness and the rising power and influence of autocratic leaders. Many long for leaders of integrity in the West who will promote impartial justice and peace, healing and hope.

At the time of Jesus of Nazareth, the Jewish people were under Roman rule and there was enormous antipathy towards the Roman government. Significantly the protest against Rome was motivated by the recollection of God’s promises through prophets such as Samuel, Isaiah and Ezekiel concerning a coming king who would establish God’s rule in the world. Jesus’ contemporaries were constantly on the lookout for a leader who would storm the citadels of Rome and bring an end to Roman authority.

Such longings were heightened at the annual Feast of the Passover for, at Passover the Jewish people looked back to their deliverance from slavery in Egypt at the time of Moses some twelve hundred years before. They also looked forward to a far greater deliverance – the day when God’s king would appear and deliver them.

As the Jesus story unfolds, we learn in the opening scene of John, chapter 6 that Jesus was rapidly becoming a celebrity. He drew large crowds who especially wanted to see him and benefit from the signs he was doing on the sick (6:2).

John’s record is sometimes called ‘the book of signs’ – a reference to Jesus’ miracles that point to his unique power and compassion. In the scene that follows, we read of a fourth sign – food for a hungry crowd!

Because of the crowds Jesus and his disciples had crossed by boat to the north-eastern side of the Sea of Galilee, the Sea of Tiberias. On arriving there they had gone up the mountain and sat down. But the crowds had followed on land by foot.

Seeing that a large crowd was coming toward him, Jesus said to Philip, “Where are we to buy bread, so that the people may eat?” (6:5). John comments that Jesus said this to test Philip. They were not near a village where there were shops and there were certainly no fast-food outlets.

Even if they could buy food, Philip observed that two hundred denarii, the equivalent of a day-laborer’s pay for two hundred days work, would not be enough to buy even a small portion of bread for everyone. Andrew, Simon Peter’s brother, had found a boy with five barley loaves and two fish, the diet of the poor. Taking the initiative, Jesus had the disciples sit the crowd of about five thousand on the grass: this is the kind of detail that assures us that John’s account of Jesus is that of an eyewitness.

Then, he took the loaves, and when he had given thanks, he distributed them to those who were seated. So also the two fish, as much as they wanted (6:11). In giving thanks, Jesus was doing what God-fearing Jewish people do before eating, indicating that God, in upholding his creation, provides the food we eat.

Being near the time of the Passover, Jesus’ miracle potentially would have reminded the crowd of the time of Moses and God’s provision of manna for his people (Exodus 16:4-36). The feeding of the crowd also looked forward, symbolising the day of which Mary, Jesus’ mother had spoken: the hungry would be filled (Luke 1:53). The crowds had done nothing to deserve this kindness. It was an act of sheer grace, a sign of God’s extraordinary generosity for people in need.

The meal not only satisfied everyone, but an abundance was left over. Twelve baskets of fragments were collected (6:13). God had provided a superabundance of food. The people saw the event as a sign. John records their response, “This is indeed the Prophet who is to come into the world!” (6:14).

But this was not the response Jesus was looking for. In John 6:15 we read: Perceiving then that they were about to come and take him by force to make him king, Jesus withdrew again to the mountain by himself.

As it was nearing Passover time, it is not surprising the Jewish people began to view Jesus as a potential revolutionary and political figure. ‘Let’s make him king. This is the Passover we’ve been waiting for’.

Throughout history there’s been a tendency for churches to politicize Christianity. We find it at the beginning of last century in the USA with the so-called social gospel movement. We also find it in Latin America mid last century with liberation theology. It’s happening today in various traditional denominations in the West with their emphasis on social justice.

Now we can sympathise with these movements because it’s right to care for the needs of the poor and address the issues of unbiased justice. But this isn’t first and foremost what Christianity is about. Jesus is not a political Messiah. He could have been, but he refused to be. He would not let them make him king. His mission and message is primarily a spiritual one – a message not primarily about food for the body but food for the soul.

It was precisely because of this emphasis that many people left him. The same thing happens today. If we were to offer Jesus Christ as the one who can tell us how to care for the poor and the hungry and provide justice and peace in the world, thousands would flock to him. But it’s because he tells us to be less concerned about our physical bodies and more concerned about our spiritual state that he’s treated with contempt by people who are only looking for political solutions.

Following the next sign, Jesus made an extraordinary claim: “Very truly, I tell you, you are looking for me, not because you saw signs, but because you ate your fill of the loaves. Do not work for the food that perishes, but for the food that endures for eternal life, which the Son of Man will give you (6:26-27).

Prayer. Almighty God, Father of all mercies, we, unworthy as we are, thank you for all your goodness and loving kindness to us and to all people. We bless you for our creation, preservation, and all the blessings of this life; but above all for your amazing love in the redemption of the world through our Lord Jesus Christ; for the means of grace and for the hope of glory. Amen.

© John G. Mason

HG Wells, historian and author of The Time Machine and The War of the Worlds once commented: ‘I am an historian. I am not a believer, but I must confess as a historian that this penniless preacher from Nazareth is irrevocably the very center of history. Jesus Christ is easily the most dominant figure in all history’.

Many agree that Jesus was a great man, perhaps the greatest teacher who has ever lived. Who would want to quarrel with his ethic, ‘Love your neighbour as yourself’? Furthermore, the quality of his life was exemplary. But is he more than this?’

In the opening scene of John chapter 5 we are taken to a pool in Jerusalem that is most likely to be found today beside St Anne’s Church in the Arab quarter in the Old City.

Known in Aramaic as Bethzatha, it is a pool bounded by five porches or porticos. In Jesus’ day the waters in the pool, fed by distant springs, would regularly bubble up. It was reckoned there were special healing qualities when the waters were disturbed.

John notes the sad scene of the sick, the blind and the lame around the edges of the pool. One day Jesus approached a man there and asked, “Do you want to be made well?”. To which he received what seems to be an evasive reply, “Sir, I have no one to help me into the pool when the waters stir”. He had been there thirty-eight years and seems to have become accustomed to the lifestyle.

“Get up. Pick up your bed and walk,” Jesus said. Unless one is absolutely sure their words have the power to restore life to paralysed limbs, it would be utter folly to say this. But Jesus had no doubts. Calmly and deliberately, he spoke. Instantly the man must have sensed Jesus’ extraordinary healing power at work. Without a word, he picked up his bed and walked.

We need to think about this. At the time I am writing, going back thirty-eight years would take us back to 1986. Assuming we were alive then, imagine how atrophied our muscles would be if we had not used them all that time. Yet this man now had the strength to get to his feet, bend down, pick up his bed and walk away with it.

In today’s world of computer design, a Hollywood film would digitally portray vitality surging down through the whole of the man’s body. The withered limbs would be taking on renewed shape and strength.

And if we had been there that day, we can only begin to imagine how astonished, perhaps dumbfounded, we would have been. We may have wanted to shout or, if we ourselves were disabled, we may have felt envious. We would certainly have been intrigued to find out more about Jesus.

But John portrays the high drama of this healing quite simply. There’s no ostentatious show. Jesus simply spoke. Furthermore, Jesus didn’t look for any expression of faith on the part of the man. He simply intervened and acted.

Now we mustn’t confuse this with any gracious act of God in healing someone who is sick today. The miracle that day was another sign that John records, pointing to the transcendent power of Jesus.

But John sounds an ominous warning: there were people around that pool that day who weren’t impressed. It was the Sabbath (5:9).

In verse 10 we read: So the Jews said to the man who had been cured, “It is the sabbath; it is not lawful for you to carry your mat.” But he answered them, “The man who made me well said to me, ‘Take up your mat and walk.’ ”

John’s expression, the Jews is a reference to the Jewish religious leadership. They weren’t in the least interested to know that someone who had been paralyzed for thirty-eight years had been healed. They were only interested in insisting on keeping rules about the sabbath they themselves had developed. “Who is the man who said to you, ‘Take it up and walk’?” they asked (5:12). The man didn’t know. Jesus had slipped into the crowd.

Jesus, in finding the man later in the temple, said to him: “See, you have been made well! Sin no more, that nothing worse may happen to you.”

Jesus was saying that the man’s healing was permanent: it wasn’t a 24-hour wonder.

Furthermore, you have been made wellindicates the man had nothing to do with his restoration – it had come from an external greater power.

Jesus’ “Sin no more…” is a challenge to the man to consider the power that had made him well: his healing could only be attributed to the restorative power of the creator God. ‘Don’t sin in not giving thanks for God’s wonderful mercy to you today. Rather, ‘Rejoice in the Lord.’

Yet what did the man do when he found out who it was who had healed him? He reported Jesus to the Jewish leaders (5:15). John records their response in verse 16: Therefore the Jews started persecuting Jesus, because he was doing such things on the sabbath.‘You don’t heal on the sabbath,’ they were saying. ‘And you certainly don’t encourage people to carry around their beds on the sabbath.’

To which Jesus responded: “My Father is still working, and I also am working.” For this reason the Jews were seeking all the more to kill him, because he was not only breaking the sabbath, but was also calling God his own Father, thereby making himself equal to God.

Jesus’ words exploded in their ears. They were furious. He was not only breaking the sabbath law – a capital offence – he was claiming to be equal with God. That was blasphemy. If they could swing it past Pilate, they’d hang him for this.

Many people say they believe in God; but who is this God they claim to know? Is he the God who is the eternal Father of the Lord Jesus?

The Jewish leaders misunderstood Jesus when they heard him say he was equal with God. They refused to bend their minds to understand his explanation.

Many today might agree that Jesus is a good teacher and a great example, but they’re not prepared to listen when he claims to be divinity who has come amongst us. Jesus wants us to know this: that he is the all-important One for everyone of us to know and to trust, to honor and to live for.

As John records, God so loved the world that he gave his only Son, so that whoever believes in him should not perish but have eternal life(3:16).

Prayer. Lord, open my eyes so that I may see the wonderful truth found in your Word – truth that enables me to know you and that gives me hope. Amen.

© John G. Mason

Christian faith is regularly considered to be ‘a leap in the dark’. Let’s think about this. Daily we take countless steps of faith – faith that the food we eat and the water we drink won’t harm us; the traffic will stop when we step out at a marked crosswalk or zebra crossing and the flight we board will land safely at the destination for which we were ticketed. We step out in faith in accord with the evidence and experiences we have.

In his Pensées, the 17th C French mathematician and philosopher, Blaise Pascal wrote: ‘If I saw nothing there which revealed a Divinity, I would come to a negative conclusion; if I saw everywhere the signs of a Creator, I would remain peacefully in faith’.

John’s Gospel is sometimes called the book of the signs – evidences that point to the existence of a transcendent power. It’s as though John had been constantly asked questions about Jesus of Nazareth. In response he put together a collection of events that happened in the course of Jesus’ life, so that his readers could meet the real Jesus.

Come with me to the story of a father who asked Jesus for help for his dying son. The story catches our attention and touches our hearts as three aspects of faith unfold.

Jesus was in Cana in Galilee when he was met by an official from the household of King Herod. The man’s title indicates he held a position of high office: he might have been the equivalent of Herod’s chief of staff. He came to Jesus because he’d doubtless heard of his growing reputation and because his son at home was dying: “Come with me,” he pleads.

But Jesus’ response is curt, bordering on the dismissive: “Unless you see signs and wonders you will not believe” (4:48).

Why was Jesus so abrupt with this desperate father? It’s hardly a response we’d expect from someone with the power to act and who purportedly cares.

Now what we need to observe is that you in Jesus’ response is not in the singular; it’s plural. Jesus isn’t saying to this anxious father, ‘Unless you personally see signs and wonders you won’t believe.’ Rather, he’s making a general statement about everyone – including you and me today. He’s saying, ‘all of you are the kind of people who won’t believe me unless you see signs and wonders.’

It’s an extraordinary statement. Jesus’ first response to an anxious father seems so negative and off-putting. No-one writing fiction would have put these words into his mouth at such a moment.

What then did Jesus mean? He is NOT saying, I find you people in Judea and Galilee to be hard-headed rationalists: you will never believe who I am. NOR is he saying, I want you to understand that it’s a real challenge for me to come up with the kind of extraordinary miracle that will awaken your faith.

Furthermore, he is NOT saying that he wouldn’t provide any evidence at all as to who he is. In other words, he is NOT saying that he wants people to have a blind faith – to take a leap in the dark.

The clue to what he is saying is found in John’s comment: Now this was the second sign that Jesus did after coming from Judea to Galilee (verse 54).

This is most important. The miracle John records here is another sign that is intended to open people’s eyes – to awaken faith. Jesus is NOT reluctant to provide us with the evidence of his unique power and his compassion – evidence that points to a transcendent figure who walked among us.

Consider the official’s response: “Sir, come down before my son dies” (4:49).

Let’s think about this. As someone in a position of authority, he was well aware of what people are like. Faced now with the prospect of his son’s death, he unexpectedly turned to someone outside the recognized religious leadership.

The drama of this event is simply stated. Think how it might be written up today. There’d be a profile of the background of the man, a detailed description of every word spoken and the details of Jesus’ action. There’d be interviews with people who witnessed what happened, with the ubiquitous question, ‘How did you feel?’

But the story here almost seems flat and disappointing. There are no emotional details. What mattered was not what was felt, but what was done.

Put yourself for a moment in the shoes of that desperate father that day. What would have gone through your mind? Is Jesus mocking me, playing with me? And think of your response to Jesus now? Is your thought, ‘How can I trust Jesus, how can I follow him when I can’t see him?

Madeleine L’Engle, writer, and author of A Wrinkle in Time, once commented, ‘I will have nothing to do with a God who cares only occasionally. I need a God who is with us always, … in the deepest depths as well as the highest heights. It is when things go wrong, when good things do not happen, when our prayers seem to have been lost, that God is most present. We do not need the sheltering wings when things go smoothly. We are closest to God in the darkness, stumbling along blindly.’

Just imagine if Herod’s official had got home and his son’s condition had worsened. He would have been the laughing-stock of Cana. And so would have been Jesus. Even in the days before social media word would have spread and no one would have trusted him again.

So, what happened? Even before he reached home, one of the official’s servants came out to meet him with good news. We can picture the anxious mother would have been caring for her son. He may have been running a high temperature in the hot and dusty climate and she had been constantly fetching wet cloths to cool him. But then there was a moment when he awoke, renewed, no longer feverish. ‘When precisely did that happen?’ the official pressed his servant. We can imagine a tense moment as the official waited for a response. “Yesterday at the seventh hour the fever left him” he was told (4:52). The seventh hour is one o’clock in the afternoon – the very hour Jesus had spoken.

So he himself believed, John records, along with his whole household (4:53).

The man’s faith was real. He wanted to share it, to let everyone know – his wife and family, his household and his neighbors. Jesus could be trusted. Here was someone with extraordinary power, who could heal a dying child from a distance.

Jesus challenges superficial faith that only looks for signs and wonders. ‘Will you trust me at my word?’ he asks. When we begin to understand that divinity has walked amongst us we will want to share what we have come to believe with others so that they too may come to believe in him.

Prayer. Almighty God, we thank you for the gift of your holy word. May it be a lantern to our feet, a light to our paths, and strength to our lives. Take us and use us to love and serve all people in the power of the Holy Spirit and in the name of your Son Jesus Christ our Lord. Amen.

© John G. Mason

In his book, God and Stephen Hawking (2011), Dr. John Lennox notes a current objection to miracles that says: ‘Now we know the laws of nature, miracles are impossible’. To which Dr. Lennox responds: ‘From a theistic perspective, the laws of nature predict what is bound to happen if God does not intervene… To argue that the laws of nature make it impossible for us to believe in the existence of God and the likelihood of his intervention in the universe is plainly false’.

Indeed, God’s people understand that ‘the laws of nature’ are the observable regularities that God the creator has built into the universe. However, such ‘laws’ don’t prevent God from intervening if he chooses. When he does, we are able to identify the irregularity and speak of it as ‘a miracle’.

A wedding in a small, impoverished village. In John chapter 2, verses 1 through 11, we read of a wedding that Jesus and his close followers attended in Cana in Galilee. A critical situation had arisen: the wine had run out. And Mary, Jesus’ mother, who seems to have been involved with the preparations for the wedding, had turned to him and asked him to do something.

At first sight Jesus’ response might seem harsh: “Woman, what concern is that to you and to me?…”

However, woman was a customary address at the time. We find other examples of it, when he spoke to a woman at a well in Samaria (John 4:21). It was the form of address he used when he spoke to his mother as he was dying on the cross, putting her in the care of John, the beloved disciple (John 19:26). He also spoke this way with Mary Magdalene in the garden after his resurrection (John 20:15). On no occasion did he address women with harshness or indifference.

Furthermore, his response: “What concern is that to you and to me?…” is a Hebrew idiom. While literally it means, ‘What to me and thee’, we need to consider the context. So, on the lips of the evil-possessed in Mark 1, it means, ‘What have we in common with you?’ (1:24). Here, as one commentator observes, the probable meaning is, ‘Your concern and mine are not the same’.

Jesus was indicating to Mary that he was no longer simply her son but was now about to begin his public ministry when he would be increasingly revealing who he really is and what he had come to do. His response to Mary’s “they have no wine”, would be much more profound and more significant than simply alleviating the pressing need at a wedding.

Yet as the story unfolded his response reveals his compassion and his extraordinary power.

Water jars. In verse 6, John tells us: Now standing there were six stone water jars for the Jewish rites of purification,… As John’s Gospel was written in the first instance for a Jewish readership, it is fair to say that John, who uses symbolism throughout his writing, wants us to understand the purpose of the water: it was for outward and ceremonial cleansing of people who were physically and spiritually unclean.

The wine. Jesus directed the servants to draw from the water jars and take it to the steward, the wedding master of ceremonies, for tasting. Recognizing the fine quality of the wine he spoke with the bridegroom, complimenting him for leaving the best wine, contrary to custom, until the last.

We are left in no doubt about the quality and superabundance of Jesus’ action. He had provided for a bridegroom in his dilemma – saving him from potential legal action, for at the time the bridegroom was responsible for the cost of the wedding. Jesus also provided a generous wedding gift: the new couple could have sold the balance of the wine to start their new home.

Some critics have responded to Jesus’ action in turning some 120 – 130 gallons of water into wine as a purposeless ‘luxury’ miracle. It’s said this miracle is unlike every other supernatural act of Jesus. On every other occasion he showed God’s concern for those in physical need.

What then do we glean from this remarkable event?

In verse 11 we read: Jesus did this, the first of his signs, in Cana of Galilee, and revealed his glory; and his disciples believed in (on) him. None of Jesus’ actions were simply designed to assuage human suffering. Yes, they do reveal God’s compassion, but they also point to the fact that in Jesus the transcendent God has come among us in person. In John’s Gospel Jesus’ extraordinary acts are spoken of as signs revealing his glory.

Furthermore, because this sign is not followed up with John’s usual spiritual discourse, we need to look more carefully at the detail of the narrative. As we observed, in verse 6 John had indicated that the water in the six stone jars was used for the Jewish rites of purification.

Given the direction of John’s narrative to the hour when Jesus said he would be glorified – in his crucifixion – we can say that the water, now turned into wine, symbolized the day when Jesus would generously provide the perfect, once and for all time spiritual cleansing for the sins of an unclean humanity – through his shed blood on the cross.

Significantly, John the Gospel writer tells us that the disciples believed in him. They did not simply believe that he was divinity walking amongst them: they put their trust in him.

Jesus’ turning the water into wine was the first occasion John records when Jesus chose to intervene and act outside ‘the laws of nature’. It was the first of the signs authenticating him as the Word of God, the Son of God incarnate.

Prayer: Lord Christ, eternal Word and Light of the Father’s glory: send your light and your truth so that we may both know and proclaim your word of life, to the glory of God the Father; for you now live and reign, God for all eternity. Amen.

© John G. Mason

In the aftermath of the events of September 11, 2001, leading new atheists such as Richard Dawkins, Sam Harris, Richard Dennett and the late Christopher Hitchens challenged the authenticity of religion. In 2007 The Sydney Morning Herald reported Richard Dawkins saying, ‘The time has come for people of reason to say: enough is enough. Religious faith discourages independent thought. It’s divisive and it’s dangerous’.

Indeed, in January 2009, the atheist society in England ran a campaign on London buses: ‘There’s Probably No God. Now stop worrying and enjoy your life’. Similar campaigns were run in Washington, DC in 2008, in Bloomington, IN, and elsewhere. It would seem voices like this contributed to the significant fall in church association over the last two decades.

Yet in recent years, with the cultural changes and values that have emerged, people are experiencing disappointment, depression and loneliness. The new atheism has not offered an agreed morality or real purpose in life. Morality based on human convention has led to an ethical relativism.

Thinking people are now asking if their worldview needs to be reviewed. With this there is a rising interest in the Jesus story and its global influence. Interestingly, Tom Holland in Dominion traces influences of the Jesus story on the West, including the values of right and wrong, justice and compassion.

With the great advances in technology, people feel isolated and sense their lives are going nowhere. They have no substantial grounds for hope. How important it is that we reintroduce the authentic story of Jesus found in the records of Matthew, Mark, Luke and John. The real story is unknown by the majority of people today – young and old.

So, how might we begin?

In 2002 Phillip Johnson published The Right Questions. Johnson who died in 2019, had been Professor of Law at the University of California, Berkeley for over three decades. He wrote that at the heart of the cultural changes today is the sharp divergence between two very different world views: ‘the Christian view that states, as in John chapter 1, verse 1: “In the beginning was the Word…”; and scientific materialism which says, “In the beginning were the particles”’ (p.136).

In an earlier chapter, he had observed that “In the beginning was the Word” is dismissed as a ‘non-cognitive utterance of religion’ and therefore one that cannot be evaluated in terms of ‘true or false’ (p.63). On the other hand, he also draws attention to an unquestioned assumption that stands behind scientific naturalism, namely that ‘the laws and the particles existed, and that these two things plus chance had to do all the creating’ (p.64).

In this context Johnson pointed out that everyone needs to ask ‘the right questions’ – especially with respect to the assumptions that stand behind scientific materialism. For example, he draws attention to President Clinton’s announcement in June 2000 with the breakthrough in understanding the human genome: “Today, we are learning the language in which God created life, we are gaining ever more awe for the complexity, the beauty, the wonder of God’s most divine and sacred gift” (p.37). And Francis Collins, the scientific director of the government’s Human Genome Project, said: “It is humbling for me and awe-inspiring to realize that we have caught the first glimpse of our instruction book, previously known only to God” (p.38).

Johnson commented that both statements ‘seem to say that the genome research actually supports the view that a supernatural mind designed the instructions that guide the immensely complex biochemical processes of life’. He also noted the negative implications, namely that ‘Clinton and Collins seemed to be repudiating the central claim of evolutionary naturalism, which is that exclusively natural causes like chance and physical law produced all the features of life…’ (p.38). Yet he also noted that most leading biologists reject the notion of God and God’s involvement.

But can the clear statements of the opening lines of John’s Gospel be easily dismissed as a prop for those who need such a foundation for life? In the beginning was the Word, we read, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. He was in the beginning with God… And in John 1:14 we learn, And the Word became flesh and lived among us,…

In his prologue John speaks of the pre-existence of the Word of God. From all eternity the Word has been enthroned in the magnificence of the glory of heaven. But John also speaks of the incarnation of the Word: he is a Person who took up residence with us. John was either spinning a falsehood or witnessing to a truth that is beyond human invention. The Gospel of John together with the other three Gospels reveal a transcendent figure.

Dr Edwin Judge, esteemed emeritus professor of history and philosophy, Macquarie University observed: ‘An ancient historian has no problem seeing the phenomenon of Jesus as an historical one. … The writings that sprang up about Jesus also reveal to us a movement of thought and an experience of life so unusual that something much more substantial than the imagination is needed to explain it’.

When we ask the right questions, we discern that there are some essential assumptions undergirding scientific or philosophical naturalism that continue to frame the objections to the Christian faith in the corridors of learning and the media – assumptions that cannot be tested and which in themselves require a step of faith. On the other hand, the step of faith in the statement that there is a creator God, is not a blind step. Its essence is grounded in a verifiable historical figure – Jesus.

It is the good news he brings that we need to embrace ourselves and introduce to others around us today. Over the next weeks I will be exploring Jesus’ seven signs we find in John’s Gospel – for they uniquely reveal a central part of the Jesus story: his power and compassion, his divinity and his humanity.

Prayer. Blessed Lord, you have caused all holy scriptures to be written for our learning, grant us so to hear them, read, mark, learn and inwardly digest them, so that, encouraged and supported by your holy Word, we may embrace and always hold fast the joyful hope of everlasting life, which you have given us in our Savior Jesus Christ.  Amen.

You might like to listen to The Perfect Wisdom of Our God from Keith and Kristyn Getty.

© John G. Mason