Looking for His glorious appearing! Titus 2:13

Jesus' Prophetic Statement
Nov 11th, 2007
Weekly Bible StudyHugh Davidson
Categories: Commentary

John 3:1-7 “There was a man of the Pharisees, named Nicodemus, a ruler of the Jews: The same came to Jesus by night, and said unto him, Rabbi, we know that thou art a teacher come from God: for no man can do these miracles that thou doest, except God be with him. Jesus answered and said unto him, Verily, verily, I say unto thee, except a man be born again, he cannot see the kingdom of God. Nicodemus saith unto him, how can a man be born when he is old? Can he enter the second time into his mother's womb, and be born? Jesus answered, Verily, verily, I say unto thee, except a man be born of water and of the Spirit, he cannot enter into the kingdom of God. That which is born of the flesh is flesh; and that which is born of the Spirit is spirit. Marvel not that I said unto thee, Ye must be born again.”

As I said before, John’s goal in writing this book was to tell us that Jesus Christ is the Son of God who came in the flesh and that His sole purpose in coming to earth was to provide the means for our salvation. And in order to show us who He is John selectively choose certain supernatural events combined with Jesus’ encounters with various individuals to give enough evidence to confirm His claims. Pascal wrote, “He gave us enough evidence to make a logical choice but not so much that we would be overwhelmed and intimidated.” Or think about it this way, God could have written the gospel message across the sky and then everyone who could see and read would have to acknowledge that He is who He says He is but that wouldn’t be faith. People would submit out of fear but fear only lasts so long.

I think chapter 3 is one of the highlights of this book. It’s the one thousandth chapter in the Bible and I think verse 16 is probably the most famous verse. John Wesley was said to have preached on the title, “You must be born again” over three hundred times. And when someone asked why He did so he said, “Because you have to be born again.” And that’s the theme of the book.

Looking back on the first two chapters we saw the credentials of Jesus. And John took his time to explain who Jesus was so we could understand what qualified Him to be the Savior of the world. And here He did what only God could do. He turned water into wine which means He made something out of nothing. After all, you can’t turn water into anything. You can change its form and make it either steam or ice but unless you add something to it you always have water. And then He cleansed the temple or as He described it, He turned a den of thieves back into the house of God.

And then as we finished last day Jesus responded to the question of His authority by pointing to the issue of His resurrection. And it can never be said enough that the resurrection is the foundation stone of the Christian faith. If Jesus wasn’t physically resurrected then we’d have to conclude that the Bible isn’t reliable. After all, He claimed that He would rise from the dead and His disciples said He did. So, the credibility of the Bible and the entire Christian faith rests on the resurrection. If anybody could disprove the resurrection then Christianity would fall apart. After all, the resurrection is what separates Jesus from all the other religious figures in history.

As Paul says in 1 Corinthians 15:13-19, “But if there be no resurrection of the dead, then is Christ not risen: and if Christ be not risen, then [is] our preaching vain, and your faith [is] also vain. Yea, and we are found false witnesses of God; because we have testified of God that he raised up Christ: whom he raised not up, if so be that the dead rise not. For if the dead rise not, then is not Christ raised: And if Christ be not raised, your faith [is] vain; ye are yet in your sins. Then they also which are fallen asleep in Christ are perished. If in this life only we have hope in Christ, we are of all men most miserable.” Paul says, the resurrection is the key because if Jesus didn’t rise then his preaching is useless and so is our faith.

And then the second claim that Jesus made was that He knew what was in the heart of man and not just any man but every man. In other words, He claims to be omniscient and that means He knows all things. And this statement is the introductory statement to chapters 3 and 4. We see His omniscience displayed when He meets Nicodemas. He’s not like us and has to sit around making small talk to get to know him but Jesus cuts right across the conversation and zeros in on where he’s at. And then He does the same with the woman at the well in chapter 4 when He tells her to go call her husband and He did this because He knew she was living in adultery. And then we see Him meeting the nobleman in chapter 4 and it says He knew that he had faith. And how did He know that? He knew what was in the heart of man.

Nicodemas was a Pharisee and as such he would have been recognized as the best that Judaism had to offer. There were only 6000 Pharisees at one time so this was a very exclusive group. Besides being a Pharisee Nicodemas was also a scholar. And even though he was Jewish his name was Greek in origin which meant his parents probably raised him to be a Hellenist which meant he read the Old Testament in Greek. And so as a Pharisee he would be considered a moral man and as a Hellenist he would be considered an educated one. And then John tells us he was also a member of the Sanhedrin who were the political, religious group that oversaw the nation.

And it’s to this popular, powerful and most likely prosperous man that Jesus responded to by saying, “Ye must be born again.” And if one of the wisest of the world’s crowd needs to be born again then so do you and I. I am, are you?

Archaeologist Uncovers Scriptures' Famed Wall
Nov 11th, 2007
UncategorizedWND. Nov. 11 2007
Categories: Today's Headlines

Dr. Eilat Mazar, one of Israel's top archaeologists, ended her presentation Wednesday to the 13th Annual Conference of the Ingeborg Rennert Center for Jerusalem Studies on "New Studies on Jerusalem," with a surprise announcement. She had discovered remnants of the fifth century B.C. wall built by Nehemiah.