Day 17 - John 5:31-47
30 Jan 2017
These are serious claims, and we should believe and act on them. But can we be expected to believe them just because Jesus says so? Yes! But Jesus goes on to say to his audience (and us) that we don’t just have to take his word for it. If we don’t believe him, there will be witnesses that show that we are wrong to do so.
The first witness is John the Baptist - we heard his testimony in the opening chapter of the gospel. His clear and consistent message was “Jesus is the son of God”. These Jews who listened and followed John should take his words seriously.
The second witness is God the Father himself. How can Jesus claim to be the Son of the Father? Surely anyone can make that claim. Jesus says “look at what I am doing”. Jesus’ works are God’s seal that Jesus is the Son of the Father. He does what the Father does - he heals the sick, turns water into wine, raises the dead.
The third witness is the most devastating for the audience Jesus has in front of him. Why don’t they believe him? They should, because they know this witness intimately. They are experts in the Old Testament scriptures. The point of those 39 books was to “bear witness” about Jesus. Yet, they failed to get the point. They ignored the hero of the story. So this witness (personified by Moses - the human author of the first five books) now testifies against them. They should have known and believed!