Do you ever get frustrated because it just feels like people aren’t listening to you? Maybe it’s because I’ve always been softer spoken and talked over, but even now when I feel like I’m yelling and screaming it can feel like no one even heard me. Then perhaps you turn to a bit of repeating, maybe some nagging, for me definitely a little resentment. Worse is when someone seems to understand and then later you realize they had no clue what you were talking about and weren’t listening. When I read the Gospel of John, I feel this frustration for Jesus. It’s like how can you all not get it, He says it over and over and over and you still just don’t understand.
In Luke 8:9-15 Jesus gives us the explanation of why he uses parables. Some will hear and believe, some will hear and forget, some won’t hear or understand at all. We’ve all seen this play out in a conversation, we recognize when someone is attentively listening and hearing, when they are only listening to respond, and when they are straight up ignoring you.
In the same way, Jesus spoke and told the truth but only those seeking to hear and understand did.
Thomas said to him, “Lord, we don’t know where you are going, so how can we know the way?”
Jesus answered, “I am the way and the truth and the life. No one comes to the Father except through me.
John 14:6
7 If you really know me, you will know my Father as well. From now on, you do know him and have seen him.” 8 Philip said, “Lord, show us the Father and that will be enough for us.” 9 Jesus answered: “Don’t you know me, Philip, even after I have been among you such a long time? Anyone who has seen me has seen the Father. How can you say, ‘Show us the Father’? 10 Don’t you believe that I am in the Father, and that the Father is in me? The words I say to you I do not speak on my own authority. Rather, it is the Father, living in me, who is doing his work. 11 Believe me when I say that I am in the Father and the Father is in me; or at least believe on the evidence of the works themselves. 12 Very truly I tell you, whoever believes in me will do the works I have been doing, and they will do even greater things than these, because I am going to the Father. 13 And I will do whatever you ask in my name, so that the Father may be glorified in the Son. 14 You may ask me for anything in my name, and I will do it. John 14:5-13
John 14:5-13
John 14:6, the sixth I am statement is one of the first bible verses I remember learning and I imagine it is for others too, it’s very popular because of its clear and concise way to declare the only way to be reconciled to our Father. All the same, it took years for me to fully understand the implications what Jesus being the only way was and the full message of his atoning death and freedom through grace.
Even longer to understand the why. Why, how can Jesus be the only way? It’s because of His divinity and being the Son of God, part of the trinity. John can’t stop emphasizing this in his Gospel, Jesus is 100% the Messiah. Fully Man. Fully God. One with the Father and Spirit. His role for all time has been to redeem us back and fulfill God’s eternal plan of salvation for His created beings (John 1; Isaiah 40; Isaiah 53)
Jesus testifies to God because God speaks His authority through Jesus, possible because they are one. He insists, even if this is hard to comprehend and believe, that He’s performed all these signs so you could see this authority. With as clear as John 14:6 is, there are still those who will not hear no matter how many times you repeat it. John 8:42-47 speaks to this:
42 Jesus said to them, “If God were your Father, you would love me, for I have come here from God. I have not come on my own; God sent me. 43 Why is my language not clear to you? Because you are unable to hear what I say. 44 You belong to your father, the devil, and you want to carry out your father’s desires. He was a murderer from the beginning, not holding to the truth, for there is no truth in him. When he lies, he speaks his native language, for he is a liar and the father of lies. 45 Yet because I tell the truth, you do not believe me! 46 Can any of you prove me guilty of sin? If I am telling the truth, why don’t you believe me? 47 Whoever belongs to God hears what God says. The reason you do not hear is that you do not belong to God
John 8:42-47
However, even knowing some won’t hear this message, we still must keep repeating it. For how long did Jesus try? He spent 3 years preaching His message and didn’t stop, then He gave us His message to keep spreading. If he didn’t give up on teaching, then neither should we. Here’s some of the times in John Jesus made the claim that He and the Father where one: John 10:30-38; John 1:1; John 5:18-20; John 17:20-25; John 8:14-19. Let’s continue this message, just as was asked of us – proclaiming to the ends of the world that He is our Messiah – the way, the truth, and the life. (Acts 1:8; Acts 20:24; Romans 10:10-17; 1 Corinthians 3:6-9).
Once I again, I was reading after writing and found the perfect passages to really drive my thoughts home. And again it was in Servants of Sovereign Joy by John Piper. This quote includes a quote from William Cowper and encourages us to keep trying, for the words of the Gospel are life to those perishing.
“One final, all important lesson: Let us rehearse the mercies of Jesus often in the presence of discouraged people. Let us point them again and again to the blood of Jesus. These were the two things that brought Cowper to faith in 1764. Remember how he said that in John 11 he “saw so much benevolence, mercy, goodness, and sympathy with miserable men in our Saviour’s conduct, that I almost shed tears” And remember how on the decisive day of awakening he said, “I saw the sufficiency of the atonement He had made, my pardon sealed in His blood, and all the fullness and completeness of His justification. “
21 Servants of Sovereign Joy: Faithful, Flawed, and Fruitful by John Piper. Pg 203, CO 2018 BY DESIRING GOD FOUNDATIONS