Pastors’ Blog

John 12:35-50
(Isaiah 6:1-13; Revelation 4:1-11)
“Whose Glory Do You Seek?”

Introduction

Each Memorial Day, we remember those who loved others more than they loved themselves, who gave their lives so that others could continue living in freedom. There is a sort of glory, well deserved, in the honor we bestow on those who have fallen in battle. But it is, by its very nature, a passing glory. This earth is littered with the bones of those cut down in youth, sent to fight their county’s wars, and they deserve the flags and songs, the parades and praise we give them. Yet, as many warriors throughout the ages have known, there is a greater glory than any mere human can bestow, a weight of glory, of substantial presence and transforming power, that marks the blessing of God’s well-done. And it is the difference between these two kinds of glory that lies at the heart of our text.

Body

1.    Three inadequate views of discipleship (12:35-43).

•    Hearing Jesus speak is essential, but insufficient (12:35-36).

The crowds have listened to Jesus gladly, and have assumed that they will always be able to hear him. But Jesus warns them, “The light is among you a little while longer” (12:35). They love to hear him tell stories of God’s mercy and grace, to hear him debate the religious leaders, to teach them of a kingdom where this world’s values are turned upside down and where God embraces those whom this world rejects. They do not realize that his public ministry is at an end and that they will seek him, but no longer find him. And they do not grasp the crucial fact that his words have always been a call, not merely to listen, but to follow. Thus here he says again, “Walk while you have the light “ (12:35).

So, too, our sermons and Bible studies, important as they are, are not enough if they leave us with the impression that the discipleship is merely about words, ideas, things learned and accepted as true. Rather, discipleship is the call to die to the people we once were and to rise to new life in Christ. Our new life, our new vocation is simply following Jesus.

•    Seeing Jesus act is essential, but insufficient (12:37).

The crowds have been astonished at the mighty works, the signs and wonders, that Jesus has performed. He has done these things to demonstrate the power of God over everything that would destroy his creation and separate us from his love: rebellion, sickness, addiction, poverty, injustice. All these things God will overturn when his kingdom comes in power and glory. It has already begun to come in Jesus’ ministry, and continues to be displayed where communities of Christians live as the Body of Christ, resisting the devil’s work and setting captives free.

But, having said that, we must remember Jesus’ warning that, “An evil and adulterous generation seeks for a sign” (Matthew 16:4). Seeing signs and wonders is not enough. John laments the unbelief of those who had seen his signs: “Though he had done so many signs before them, they still did not believe in him” (12:37). This is why John quotes the prophet Isaiah. When Isaiah saw God’s glory, he realized his vocation: “And I heard the voice of the Lord saying, ‘Whom shall I send, and who will go for us?’ Then I said, ‘Here am I! Send me’” (Isaiah 6:8). What is John’s point? Just this: It is not merely seeing signs and wonders that transforms people. It is seeing what those signs and wonders signify, namely, the glory of God. It is recognizing God’s glory that changes a person forever. And the proper response, the only sane response, to God’s glory is obedience, following Jesus.

•    Believing in Jesus is essential, but insufficient (12:42).

We must be very careful here: In one sense, believing is certainly enough. In fact at the end of this gospel, John will say that his gospel was written “so that you may believe that Jesus is the Christ, the Son of God, and that by believing you may have life in his name” (20:31). However, way back at the end of chapter two, John had already begun warning us that there is a difference between true belief and false, between faith that is natural and reflexive, and faith that is the gift of God.  So here, he describes leaders who “believed in him, but for fear of the Pharisees they did not confess it, so that they would not be put out of the synagogue; for they loved the glory that comes from man more than the glory that comes from God” (12:42-43).

The faith that is God’s gift, the faith that lays hold upon God’s grace, is not merely assent to certain gospel truths. It is rather faith that acts upon the truths believed. Not merely hearing, but doing. It is faith that turns from the sad quest for human glory to a quest for the glory that is God’s alone and that he only gives to those who are his.

2.    Three marks of true discipleship:

•    Making the costly confession of Jesus Christ as Lord (12:42).

So, a disciple is one who is willing, no matter what the cost, to confess Jesus as Lord. As Jesus said on another occasion, “whoever acknowledges me before men, the Son of Man also will acknowledge before the angels of God, but the one who denies me before men will be denied before the angels of God” (Luke 12:8-9). And, in the words of the apostle Paul, “if you confess with your mouth that Jesus is Lord and believe in your heart that God raised him from the dead, you will be saved. For with the heart one believes and is justified, and with the mouth one confesses and is saved” (Romans 10:9-10).

•    Seeking God’s glory rather than the glory of men (12:43).

Glory is much more than mere praise. Its Hebrew meaning is weightiness, substance, reality, presence. It is ultimately seeking the presence and reality of God, as well as God’s praise, above the reality and presence of anyone else. And those who seek him find him, when they seek him with all their hearts (Jeremiah 29:13).

•    Not merely hearing, but doing God’s Word (12:47).

The great mark of the disciple of Jesus, of one who seeks God’s glory rather than the fleeting glory of man, is a growing, joyful obedience, a heart that responds to God’s grace as did the prophet Isaiah: “Here am I! Send me.”  We respond because we have come to know that hearing Jesus words is hearing God Word, that seeing Jesus act is seeing God at work, that trusting and obeying him is life and joy and peace, walking out of darkness into light, out of death into life.

Conclusion

What of you? Perhaps you have been listening and watching for years. Perhaps you even believe that the gospel is true. Yet you’re still seeking the glory of this passing world rather than giving up “what you cannot keep to gain what you cannot lose” (Jim Elliot). Don’t miss the most important thing, the only eternally important thing. Don’t miss life as he passes you by and calls out, “Come, follow me!” Cry out, “Here am I! Send me.” And then get up and begin to follow the Light of the World, who is this world’s only hope, the only way to everlasting life.

John 12:20-36
(Job 19:23-27; Romans 7:4-6)
“Dying to Live”

Introduction

John has already told us that everyone who went up to Jerusalem for what was Jesus’ final Passover was looking for Jesus (11:56). Some were looking in the hope of that he was the promised Messiah who would restore the kingdom. Others, those in power who had much to lose if there were a political or religious upheaval, were looking for him in hope of arresting him and getting him out of the public spotlight. But there were also those in Jerusalem who had come out of curiosity, interested in religion, and eager to meet anyone in the news. So one such group, who happened to be Greek, found Philip and asked for an introduction to Jesus. They had heard of Jesus, and were fascinated with the idea of meeting him and perhaps seeing him do something out-of-the-ordinary. “Let’s try to interview him and see what he’s like. We’ll have a great story when we return home.” So they say to Philip, “Sir, we wish to see Jesus.”

Many churches put that verse as a plaque inside the pulpit to remind the preacher that it is all about Jesus and not about the person preaching. But the question here is whether these Gentiles had any idea what they were asking. Were they ready, if they saw Jesus for who he is, to fall on their face before him, as did Peter, and to cry out, “Depart from me for I am a sinful man!”? Were they prepared, if he was who he claimed to be, to confess with Thomas, “My Lord and my God”? How many of us come to church just hoping for a look, without comprehending what is really involved in seeing the Lord of glory, without having any desire at all to have our lives turned upside down and inside out by the Lord of glory? Is it any wonder we often leave disappointed and unfulfilled?

There was only one person present in Jerusalem who knew what was happening, who had counted the cost and stood ready to do whatever it took to glorify his Father by sacrificing himself for the sins of his people. At the center of the scene stood Jesus, whose response to the expectations of his disciples, to the intrigues of his opponents, and to the curiosity of the Gentiles, was to state what he had entered Jerusalem to do: “The hour has come for the Son of Man to be glorified.” To be glorified? How? He is about to be arrested, tried and convicted, stripped naked, beaten, spat upon, nailed to a cross and mocked as he slowly suffocates. How can he speak of being glorified? Does he plan to ascend Israel’s throne and receive the adoration of the crowd? Does he plan to overthrow Rome? No! Listen carefully to his prophetic words: “Truly, truly, I say to you, unless a grain of wheat falls into the earth and dies, it remains alone; but if it dies, it bears much fruit” (12:24). And then these words, “And I, when I am lifted up from the earth, will draw all people to myself” (12:32).

Here, we find the master teacher painting a picture, stating a principle and making a promise.

Body

1.    First, Jesus paints a picture: “Unless a grain of wheat falls into the earth and dies, it remains alone; but if it dies it bears much fruit” (12: 24).

We’ve seen this familiar picture splendidly portrayed in another lovely east Tennessee spring. The earth seems to die, the flowers fade, the trees shed their leaves, but as the earth sleeps, seeds are settling in the soil awaiting the spring rains and the warmth of the sun to call forth new life. The seeds of one flower multiply into many. Thus it has ever been. From this familiar picture, Jesus draws a lesson and states it as a principle that all accept in the world of plants, but that we resist in the world of people, because it calls on us to die.

2.    Second, Jesus states a principle: “Whoever loves his life loses it, and whoever hates his life in this world will keep it for eternal life” (12:25).

This seems to counter everything we naturally feel and think. We cling to life as a natural response to danger. But Jesus calls us to recognize a spiritual principal at work here. As long as we think that life is all about us, that God and the gospel and other people all exist to help us fulfill our hopes and dreams, as long as we are willing to sacrifice others to get what we want, rather than sacrifice ourselves, our hopes and dreams, so that others might live, until then we are still living out of the old life, a life that Christ did not come to improve, but rather came to put to death in his death. This is at the heart of his call to us here: Unless we are willing to follow him in his death, we can never know the new life he came to give us through his resurrection from the dead.

3.    Finally, Jesus makes a promise: “If anyone serves me, he must follow me; and where I am, there will my servant be also. If anyone serves me, the Father will honor him” (12:26).

This promise is contingent on our following Jesus. We cannot follow him unless we have died to our old life and been raised up in him to newness of life. In the power of the new life, with new desires, new dreams and affections, we follow him into the day. We walk in the light and have fellowship with the one who is this world’s Light.

And here is the greatest wonder of all: the glory that Jesus gave the Father by laying down his life, and the glory he received by being lifted up on the cross in willing obedience to the Father, this same glory he gives to us, his people.  Thus, he promises, “If anyone serves me, the Father will honor him” (12:26). And so he will later pray in the upper room, “The glory that you have given me I have given them, that they may be one even as we are one” (17:22).

We seek honor from one another, and doing so we miss the honor that God alone can give, the only lasting honor and glory, which is given in Christ to the sons and daughters of God by grace through faith in God’s Son.

Conclusion

So, what shall we say, what shall we do, in response to this? If we cling to things as they are, we will miss what we were created for. If we are willing to die to our will, our way, die to our hopes and dreams, and trust the Lord to give us better ones, with a new beginning, a new nature, a new power and a new destiny, in other words, a new life in exchange for the old one, then we will find what we’ve been looking and longing for all our life. And in the process, we will bring life to many others for, “Unless a grain of wheat falls into the earth and dies, it remains alone; but if it dies it bears much fruit.”