“Power tends to corrupt and absolute power corrupts absolutely,” Lord Acton wrote in his correspondence with Bishop Creighton in England in 1887. Reflecting on the moral issues in writing a history of the Inquisition, Lord Acton considered that all people, including political and spiritual leaders, should be held to the same moral standard.

The problem, as Lord Acton observed, is that leaders are inclined to use their powers corruptly. Especially is this true of despotic rulers who are not held accountable. How we need to thank the Lord for good leaders while also praying for them – for they are not perfect. Indeed, as Paul the Apostle urges us in First Timothy chapter 2, we need to pray for the leaders of all nations.

Significantly, the wrongs that leaders can perpetrate contrast sharply with the story of Jesus of Nazareth.

Come back with me in time some two and a half millennia, when the little kingdom of Judah in the Middle-East was facing the rise of great powers. In the 8th century BC the Assyrian imperial army rampaged through the Middle East and sacked the northern kingdom of Israel. A century later the Babylonian armies were on the rise, and it was only a matter of time before Judah received the unwelcome attention of those powerful forces.

How would Judah survive? She had no army to speak of, no money and no allies. Greater nations had already been cut down. Political obliteration seemed inevitable. Yet despite the odds, Judah’s morale was not destroyed. A glimmer of hope was on the horizon.

It was Isaiah, one of the prophets who had spoken of doom and despair, who wrote about a special leader who would be raised up. In Isaiah chapter 11, features of God’s promised king unfold.

A leader after God’s own heart. Isaiah was disappointed by the politicians of his day. They were corrupt: they took bribes, ignored the poor, and turned a blind eye to justice. King Ahaz, for example, had broken every trust given to him. He had even used the gold of the Temple to try to bribe Assyria and prevent her march on Jerusalem. He’d failed. He was another ruler who’d let his people down.

Time and time again, rulers and governments do that. In most western democracies today election promises are constantly consigned to the trash.

In chapter 11, verse 1, Isaiah offers hope: A shoot shall come out from the stump of Jesse, and a branch shall grow out of his roots.

Jesse was the father of King David, the great king in the Old Testament. Just as David himself had come out of obscurity, Isaiah is saying, so too a new king would emerge, and he would be greater than David and his son Solomon.

The spirit of the Lord shall rest on him, the spirit of wisdom and understanding, Isaiah says, the spirit of counsel and might, the spirit of knowledge and the fear of the Lord. His delight shall be in the fear of the Lord (Isaiah 11:2-3).

Wisdom, understanding and knowledge would characterize this king’s rule. But fundamental would be his willingness to learn from God. There would be no political blunders in his rule. Furthermore, corruption would not plague his government; the media wouldn’t be able to destroy him – either over his personal integrity or his policies. No one would be living in poverty or without a home.

A leader who would use his power for peace. The metaphors in verse 6 are vivid: The wolf shall live with the lamb, the leopard shall lie down with the kid, the calf and the lion and the fatling together, and a little child shall lead them. Peace would be the mark of this leader’s rule.

Periods of world peace are fleeting. The war in Ukraine and the conflict in the Middle-East today have expunged the view that the world had at last entered a time of safety, security and prosperity. Yet Isaiah insists that under God’s ruler there will be no incompetence, no corruption, no violence – only justice and peace. Could it be true?

A leader who draws his people from the nations. Isaiah doesn’t stop there, for in verses 10 though 16 he portrays people coming from all parts of the world, like a scattered army, to rally around this ruler. It will be a victorious, redeemed community, he says (11:15). People will come from the East and the West. Highways will be built to God’s City so that people from every nation can come. It’s a vivid and poetic picture.

Understandably we ask, ‘Could it happen?’ ‘Who is this root of Jesse, this ruler to whom the people rally, who will restore creation to its pristine harmony?’ Jesus.

Some eight hundred years before Jesus came, Isaiah predicted the first coming of God’s king as well as his return. This is one of the amazing things about the Bible that convinces me that it is what it claims to be – namely, God’s deliberate, progressive, self-revelation.

Centuries before Jesus came, Isaiah opened a window on Jesus’ life and work. Wise men did come from the Far East to pay him homage at his birth. And people from around the world have been coming to him ever since his death and resurrection.

The Gospel writers reveal that Jesus not only taught but backed up his words with action that showed God’s compassion for a sick and sorry world. He fed the hungry, healed the sick, and dealt with the powers of evil.

As the New Testament unfolds, we learn that the coming of God’s king is in two parts. His first coming was a rescue operation; his return will reveal the king in all his might, majesty dominion and power. He will bring his perfect justice to bear and, with the unveiling of his own glory, will reveal the glory of all who have truly turned to him.

His first coming we celebrate at Christmas. In this season of Advent, the four weeks before Christmas, we focus on the reality of his return.

Our hope is bound up in God’s king. For the death of the king on the cross comes between God’s good creation, ruined by human sin with which the Bible begins, and the promise of a restored creation with which the Bible ends. God will wipe away every tear from our eyes… there will be no more death or mourning or crying or pain, for the old order of things has passed away (Revelation 21:4).

A 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 may want to listen to Christ Our Hope in Life and Death from Keith and Kristyn Getty and Matt Papa.

The Advent Word on Wednesday series is adapted from my 2022 Advent series.

© John G. Mason

In his Pensées Blaise Pascal, the 17th century French mathematician and philosopher wrote, “Everyone seeks happiness. This is without exception. Whatever different means they employ, they all tend to this end…”

John the Gospel writer tells us of a woman at a well in Samaria two thousand years ago who would have agreed. Like us, she longed for happiness, but it had eluded her. Five failed marriages testified to that.

Thinking that love, sex and marriage would give her life meaning and happiness, she thought that each new man would be the answer. But each time she made the same mistake. Her life was a mess. Lonely and insecure, dissatisfied and empty, she was having to draw water from the well by herself at the heat of the day.

But there came a time when her life was transformed through an unexpected conversation with a Jewish man. Ignoring social, cultural and political taboos, Jesus made a simple request for water from the well. He didn’t talk about her life or matters of faith – at least to begin with. Rather he spoke then, as he speaks to us today, with concern and respect.

However, it wasn’t long before he took the conversation to another level by speaking to her about living water. This provided a natural opportunity for her to open up about her hopes.

It happened this way. Jesus said to her, “Everyone who drinks of this water will be thirsty again, but those who drink of the water that I will give them will never be thirsty. The water that I will give will become in them a spring of water gushing up to eternal life” (John 4:12-14).

On a really hot day a glass of crystal clear, cold water is so refreshing. Jesus was offering water of a very different nature – not the reinvigorating physical water we enjoy, but water of such vitality that satisfies our deep inner spiritual thirst. He was saying he is the answer to the regrets and to the emptiness that gnaws at our souls. His words point to the reality that we are much more than the sum of our parts: we have souls – a spiritual dimension to our lives that needs to be nourished. Life with Jesus can be a cascade of fulfillment and joy.

The woman said to him, “Sir, give me this water, so that I may never be thirsty or have to keep coming here to draw water” (John 4: 15). There’s a wistfulness in her words. It’s as if she was saying, ‘It would be great if you could do it, stranger. If only you could free me from this life of loneliness and regret’.

Her response opened a door of opportunity for Jesus to talk about her life. Most of us aren’t willing to be honest about how we’re really doing and the woman that day was no exception. We pretend we’re doing well but the reality is that we often have a sense of hopelessness about life that we won’t admit to. So, we endeavor to offset our sense of emptiness by filling our social calendar, making money, being a success, pursuing sexual adventure. But it never works.

No matter how successful we are or how intense the emotional experiences we might have, nothing can be a substitute for the relationship with God for which we are made. But if we’re going to find Jesus’s answer to our longing for happiness, we first have to admit our need.

Jesus said to her, “Go, call your husband, and come back.” The woman answered him, “I have no husband.” Jesus said to her, “You are right in saying, ‘I have no husband’; for you have had five husbands, and the one you have now is not your husband. What you have said is true!” The woman said to him, “Sir, I see that you are a prophet…” (4:16-19)

Suddenly the woman realized that the man with whom she was speaking was nothing less than a prophet who was aware of her life and lifestyle. And deep down, she knew that her selfish, self-centered, indulgent life was going nowhere. She was also aware that Jesus was challenging her to sort out her relationship with God. The big question was where to do this – the temple in Jerusalem, or in Samaria?

Jesus’s response is unexpected: “You worship what you do not know; we worship what we know, for salvation is from the Jews. But the hour is coming, and is now here, when the true worshipers will worship the Father in spirit and truth, for the Father seeks such as these to worship him. God is spirit, and those who worship him must worship in spirit and truth” (4:22-24).

He isn’t saying that it doesn’t matter what you believe so long as you’re sincere. Spirit and truth are not just synonyms for sincerity. When Jesus speaks of truth, he is talking about the inner reality of God’s being which becomes visible to us through him, Jesus.

True worship involves relating to Jesus – who he is and what he has done for us. Later he says, “I am the way and the truth and the life; no one comes to the Father except through me” (John 14:6).

The woman responded, “I know that Messiah is coming” (who is called Christ). “When he comes, he will proclaim all things to us”. Jesus’s response is breath-taking, “I am he, the one who is speaking to you” – literally, ‘I who am speaking to you, I am’ (4:26).

In the lead up to the exodus from Egypt, God had revealed his name to Moses in Exodus, chapter 3: “I am that I am that is my name”. Jesus was not just claiming to be the Messiah but to be one with God.

The water that Jesus promised the woman that day would bring her into a deep, satisfying and eternal friendship with God. Four centuries later, Augustine, Bishop of North Africa wrote, ‘Our souls are restless until they find their rest in thee’.

The eternal life that Jesus talks about, the water that will truly satisfy us, isn’t found in some new sexual experience or the acquisition of the latest phone. Indeed, because we were made first and foremost for relationship with God, the answer to our cry for happiness isn’t even a new religious experience. It involves a personal relationship with Jesus. Jesus is God in the flesh. He gives us life by giving us himself.

Just look at what the woman did: Leaving her water jar… John records (4:28). The symbol of her emptiness now lay discarded at Jesus’s feet.

She had found the living water, for she had found someone who knew her and yet had compassion for her, someone who pointed to the existence of a transcendent, caring God. Things would never be the same again.

“Come, see a man who told me all that I ever did” she said to people in her village. “Can this be the Christ?” (4:29). John records that many Samaritans responded by coming and listening to Jesus teach. And many believed him to be the Savior of the world (4:42).

There are tens of thousands of people with regrets and empty lives like this woman. Many are dismissive of finding hope in churches because they feel betrayed: God’s Word is not faithfully taught with compassion. How important it is we turn afresh to the real Jesus story and learn of the compassion and care he showed towards women and to everyone.

Prayer: Almighty God, we confess that we have no power of ourselves to help ourselves: open our eyes to know that you not only exist but that in your great love you care for us. We ask this in and through our Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ. Amen.

© John G. Mason

‘Do you want to live forever?’ was the question leading into an article, ‘From Here to Eternity’ in The Weekend Australian magazine (May 27-28, 2023). ‘Coming back from the dead, then living as an immortal?’ the article began. ‘It sounds like science fiction, but the pioneers behind this wild venture are true believers’.

The article took up personal stories of a small number who believe in the science of freezing their body at death and holding it in ‘cryonic suspension’ until a future time when science and medicine will have addressed the issues of aging, disease, and death – a day when they will be resurrected.

While almost all scientists reject such a development, two features stand out: only a very tiny number would benefit; second, given the world’s history of conflict and war, there is little hope that anyone ‘waking’ in fifty or three hundred years will find a world of just and lasting peace. Would we really want to live forever in such a world?

In the penultimate chapter of John’s record of the Jesus Story, we read of an eighth sign – Jesus’ own resurrection from the dead.

It was most likely at Passover time in either 30 or 33AD that Jesus was put to death by crucifixion. Tacitus, the Roman historian reported in his Annals of Imperial Rome: ‘Christ, … had undergone the death penalty in the reign of Tiberius, by sentence of the procurator Pontius Pilate …’

Yet John, together with the other three ‘Gospel’ writers, records the most significant event in human history: following his crucifixion, Jesus was seen alive, physically risen from the dead.

The first witnesses. John, chapter 19 concludes with the record that two highly positioned wealthy men, Joseph of Arimathea and Nicodemus, had buried Jesus’ body according to Jewish custom, wrapping it in linen cloths spiced with a mixture of myrrh and aloes. It was a new tomb and fulfilled what Isaiah prophesied eight hundred years before, his tomb was with the rich (Isaiah 53:9).

In the opening lines of chapter 20, the Apostle John relates his experience on the morning of the third day following Jesus’ crucifixion. Mary of Magdala, one of the women who went to the tomb, ran back to tell Peter and John it was empty. “They have taken the Lord out of the tomb,” she said, “and we do not know where they have laid him” (John 20:2).

Despite the testimony of women being treated as unreliable and insignificant in first century Judaism, women were the first witnesses of the empty tomb. No Jewish writer would have written this if the account were fiction.

Furthermore, John the Apostle’s own testimony has the ring of an eyewitness. He tells us that being younger he outran Peter, but he didn’t enter the tomb first: Peter did. Both saw the linen wrappings lying there and the linen cloth that had been around Jesus’ head… rolled up in another place. It was as though Jesus’ body had passed through the shroud which included some one hundred pounds weight of expensive myrrh and aloes (John 19:39) and the head covering had been discarded. It seemed that human hands had not removed the body. What did it mean?

John reports that he saw and believed (20:8). But in the next sentence he tells us that neither he nor Peter understood it. Like Martha who had told Jesus she knew her brother Lazarus would rise from the dead on the last day (John 11:24), John seems to have believed that Jesus had gone to be with God the Father, as he had said (John 14:2-4).

Neither he nor Peter understood what Jesus meant when he said they would see him again, physically risen from the dead. We need to grasp this, for it emphasises the unexpectedness and authenticity of what happened.

Despair. We need to appreciate how Jesus’ first friends felt when they saw him strung up on a cross. For three years they’d been with him. They’d seen him turn water into wine, heal a dying boy from afar, feed a crowd of five thousand from a lunch-box of five barley loaves and two pickled fish, and restore sight to a man born blind. They’d even watched when, standing at the entrance of a tomb, he called out to a man who had been dead for four days: “Lazarus, come out” (John 11:43).

Then to their horror, they’d watched him die! And they’d heard his shout of victory, “It is finished” – my work is done (John 19:30) – as he died.

Their minds were numb with the shock that such an innocent man who had used his powers to serve others, should die a common criminal. No wonder they hid behind locked doors, fearing for their own lives.

John records that on that Sunday evening, Jesus suddenly stood in the midst of his disciples. His words, Jesus stood, contrast with the time they had last seen him – hanging on a cross, wounded and bleeding, wracked with pain, dying. And when they had seen the spear thrust in his side, they knew he was dead.

Yet here Jesus was, not weak and limp, but standing, tall and erect, in command, repeating words he had spoken when he was last with them: “Peace be with you”. And to prove he was real and not a ghost, he showed them his hands and his side (20:19f).

Bewildered and confused though they were, they nevertheless knew that Jesus was alive. “Peace be with you!” he said again. At their last meal he had promised, “My peace I leave with you… Don’t let your hearts be troubled. Believe in me” (John 14:27).

They were overjoyed, but their minds couldn’t fully grasp what was happening. It was like a dream.

The words of the Greek philosopher Heraclitus are apt: ‘Unless you expect the unexpected you will never find truth, for it is hard to discover and hard to attain’. And last century G.K. Chesterton remarked, ‘Truth is stranger than fiction, for fiction is the creation of the human mind and therefore congenial to it.’

As I have mentioned previously, Jesus’ resurrection is not the result of a natural law that can be tested. Rather, as the New Testament tells us, it happened because God chose to over-rule, using his awesome, supernatural power (Romans 6:4b). No-one has been able to prove conclusively that it didn’t happen.

Given that life and death matters are at stake, it’s imperative we ask whether the account of Jesus’ resurrection is an invention. I say this because the resurrection is foundational for Christianity. If it’s false, let’s eat, drink and be merry, for tomorrow we die. If it’s true, it’s life-changing.

John sets out the purpose of his writing in chapter 20, verses 30 and 31: Now Jesus did many other signs in the presence of his disciples, which are not written in this book. But these are written so that you may come to believe that Jesus is the Messiah, the Son of God, and that through believing you may have life in his name.

Prayer: Almighty God, you have conquered death through your dearly beloved Son Jesus Christ and have opened to us the gate of everlasting life: grant us by your grace to set our mind on things above, so that by your continual help our whole life may be transformed; through Jesus Christ our Lord, who is alive and reigns with you and the Holy Spirit in everlasting glory. Amen.

© John G. Mason

The subject of death is not something we usually discuss. It’s too personal and confronting. Yet it’s the ultimate certainty we all face. It’s why literature, film and philosophy so often dwell on the themes of our mortality. But it’s rare that anyone claims they can do anything about it. Death is the inevitable end for everyone.

In John chapter 10 we learn that life had been heating up for Jesus in Jerusalem. The Jewish leaders had attempted to stone him for his apparent blasphemy (10:31).

So he left the city for the region east of the Jordan River. There he learned that his friend Lazarus, brother of Martha and Mary, was dying in the village of Bethany, near Jerusalem. Then, learning that Lazarus had died, and against the advice of his disciples who feared the Jewish leaders, Jesus returned to Bethany where he was first met by Martha.

In the course of their conversation where she said to Jesus that if he had come sooner her brother would not have died, he made an amazing assertion: “I am the resurrection and the life. Those who believe in me, even though they die, will live, and everyone who lives and believes in me will never die.”

His words are astonishing, for in saying, “I am the resurrection and the life…” Jesus wasn’t saying, ‘I promise resurrection and life’. Nor was he saying, ‘I procure,’ or, ‘I bring’ but ‘I am the resurrection and the life.’

Furthermore, in saying ‘I am’ he uses the very words God used when he disclosed his name to Moses. Unless Jesus is equal with God his words are nothing short of blasphemy.

“I am the resurrection and the life…” he says. “Do you believe this?” he asked Martha.

John records that Jesus then met Martha’s sister, Mary who fell at his feet and said, “Lord, if you had been here, my brother would not have died.”

Once again Jesus was rebuked for not having come sooner. But unlike Martha, Mary allows her grief to flow. John tells us then that Martha and Mary weren’t the only ones to grieve:

Jesus wept (11:35).

These words form the shortest verse in the Bible. How poignant, how stark it is.

The word wept that John uses speaks of a deep anguished cry of grief. It’s the cry of heartfelt loss, the kind of grief that explodes from the depths of our inner being.

Why did Jesus react this way? He didn’t weep like this when news came that Jairus’s daughter had died. Certainly Lazarus was a close friend, but Jesus knew he was going to pull him out of that tomb.

Jesus wept. I suggest he was grieving for our human plight. No matter how successful we are, how good and compassionate we are, death awaits us all.

Men and women, created in God’s image, are now broken images and broken images cannot endure the pure light of God’s perfection and glory. Jesus was grieving for what we, and all humanity had lost. As in Adam all die, Paul the Apostle writes in First Corinthians chapter 15.

At Lazarus’s graveside, Jesus felt the full impact of this and wept. But there is a sense in which Jesus grieved at what our loss would mean for him. It would mean that he himself would have to die. Only through his death could he conquer death and raise to life anyone who turns to him and believes in him. For as in Adam all die, so in Christ shall all be made alive (1 Corinthians 15:22).

Could it be true? The witness of Jesus’ own resurrection, the New Testament, the evidence of history, the existence of the Christian church, point to the conclusion that Jesus’ words are the truth. Apart from Jesus Christ we have no certainty about the future.

And if there is a future life, how can we be assured that we are good enough to achieve it? Most people are aware of their failures – failures that we don’t want to talk about, let alone tell anyone about. It’s one of the reasons John Newton’s Amazing Grace is so well known: it speaks to our sense of lostness, our need to be rescued and our hope for the future.

John’s record doesn’t stop with Jesus’ words to Martha and Mary. He went to the tomb and asked that the stone be rolled away. We can only imagine the scene. A graveyard, a cave in a hillside, filled with bodies and bones. The stench of rotting bodies as the gravestone was rolled aside.

And then, standing at the entrance of the tomb, Jesus called, “Lazarus, come out!”

For a moment everyone must have thought he was mad. But then, a sight to behold: still in his grave clothes Lazarus appeared.

Voices around us today insist that because we now know the laws of nature we can be sure that miracles like this can’t happen. But, as we have noted, Dr. John Lennox, emeritus professor of mathematics and philosophy at Oxford University, responds, the laws of nature don’t prevent God from intervening if he chooses.

Men and women have come a long way in understanding and harnessing quantum chemistry, physics and medicine, but nothing compares with the naked power Jesus wielded that day.

The scene is a picture of a time yet to come when Jesus will once again appear on the stage of world events. On that day he will cry out in a loud voice, “Come forth,” and all the dead from throughout time will rise.

The question Jesus had asked Martha that day was: “Do you believe this?” Let me ask: Can you say with Martha, “Yes Lord. I believe that you are the Christ, the Son of God, who was to come into the world?” Death is not the end of our story. Rather for all who turn to Jesus and believe in him, death opens the door to the beginning of a new life that is everlasting.

Prayer. We beseech you, almighty God, to look in mercy on your people; so that by your great goodness we may be governed and preserved evermore; through Jesus Christ our Lord. Amen.

© John G. Mason

In March 1973, Pink Floyd introduced the line, ‘The dark side of the moon’. The album enjoyed great success addressing dark questions about life. The theme of darkness surfaced again with the 2013 movie, Gravity where Sandra Bullock is left untethered in space. The visceral terror of darkness and helplessness is palpable.

Many today experience the black hole of depression – feeling that the light of life has been sucked out of them.

With the sixth of the seven signs that we find in the Gospel According to John, Jesus encounters a man who was blind from birth. The account of the events that unfold are found in John chapter 9 – a chapter that reads like a drama.

The first act opens with an introduction: As Jesus passed by, he saw a man blind from his birth. And his disciples asked him, ‘Rabbi, who sinned, this man or his parents, that he was born blind?’ Jesus answered, ‘It was not that this man sinned, or his parents, but that the works of God might be made manifest in him. We must work the works of him who sent me’ (9:1-4a).

A blind man begging on the side of the road was a familiar sight. But this man hadn’t contracted blindness through the dusty, disease laden air of the roads. He had been born blind, and the question Jesus’ close followers asked reflected Jewish theology: ‘Who sinned? This man or his parents?’ they asked. People often ask a similar question today when things go awry: ‘What have I done to deserve this?’

Jesus’ response was unexpected: sin hadn’t led to this man’s blindness. Rather, it was to reveal God’s power. Consider the simplicity of the drama that followed. Jesus doesn’t look for any expression of faith, he simply acts. And, once more he wields the re-creative power of God. It’s another sign that points to the unique power and compassion of Jesus. He is a unique man doing unique things.

He spat on the ground, made clay and anointed the man’s eyes. ‘Go and wash…’ he commanded. The man obeyed and returned seeing.

Just think how this simply stated drama would be written up today. There’d be a detailed description of what Jesus said and did. There’d be interviews with people who witnessed it, together with the inevitable question: ‘How did you feel?’ The gospel record almost seems flat and disappointing. As we have noted before, what mattered was not what was felt, but what was done.

Another sign had occurred. Now what?

A second act unfolds with five very different conversations, revealing that the man had not only been physically blind but also spiritually blind.

In the first conversation neighbors were confused. They were uncertain that the man they now saw was the blind beggar they had known. ‘I am the man,’ he repeated. “The man called Jesus made mud and anointed my eyes and said to me, ‘Go to Siloam and wash.’ So I went and washed and received my sight” (9:11).

But signs of tension emerge with a second conversation revealing the inability of people whose views are intractable to respect and listen to the experience of others.

One of the groups of Jewish religious leaders, the Pharisees, disputed the credentials of someone who healed on the Sabbath (9:13-17). ‘No one who is truly from God would heal on the Sabbath,’ they said. ‘How could someone who breaks the law – and therefore a sinner – do such signs? What do you think?’, they asked the man. “He’s a prophet,” he responded (9:17).

In a third conversation the Pharisees spoke with the parents of the man. In response to their questioning, the parents insisted their son was born blind but could now see. The Pharisees responded by warning that anyone who said the man who had healed him is the Christ, would be excommunicated. ‘Don’t involve us,’ the parents said. ‘Ask our son. He is of age.’

And in a fourth conversation, when once more the Pharisees spoke with the healed man, they pressured him saying, “Give glory to God. We know this man is a sinner” (9:24). But the man wasn’t shaken. He knew he had been born blind and that now he could see. He was also beginning to see that these revered leaders were blind to the truth.

“We know that God has spoken to Moses,” they said, “but as for this man, we don’t know where he comes from” (9:29). You call this man a sinner, the man responded, and yet he opened my eyes. To which the Pharisees correctly and very significantly replied, “…Never since the world began has it been heard that anyone opened the eyes of a man born blind” (9:32). If this man were not from God, he could do nothing, the man answered.

The fifth conversation is one of the most beautiful found in the Bible (9:35-37). The man was rejected by the religious leaders but Jesus sought him out. ‘Do you believe in the Son of Man?’, he asked. The man’s answer is honest and open: “Who is he sir, that I may believe in him?” Jesus’ response is stunning: “You have seen him and it is he who is speaking to you” (9:36f). “Lord, I believe,” and he worshipped him.

There are few mountain peaks higher in John’s record. The man began by calling Jesus a man (9:11) and then a prophet (9:17). Later he said, this man must be from God. Now he worships Jesus as Lord.

It’s a road many people travel as they awaken in their understanding of Jesus: he did live; he is a prophet; he must be from God; He is God – He is my Lord.

Whenever Jesus spoke, he created tension within people. This continues today, for every time we talk about Jesus, people will react in one of two ways. Some will want to find out more and in time, come into the light of faith. Others will choose the darkness of unbelief.

Through the sign or miracle Jesus performed, through his own testimony, and through the witness of the formerly blind man, John reveals that Jesus is truly and uniquely the man from heaven. In the healing of the man born blind, we see God’s greater purpose: to give us spiritual sight – something he alone can do. We can’t get it by our own efforts. God opens eyes, drawing us to the truth and a living faith in the Lord Jesus.

A prayer. Almighty God, grant that we, who justly deserve to be punished for our sinful deeds, may in your mercy and kindness be pardoned and restored; through our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ. Amen.

You might like to listen to the song, By Faith from Keith and Kristyn Getty and Stuart Townend.

© John G. Mason

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