#21 Who is Jesus in the book of John?
Jesus in the book of john is the Jesus that new believers and searching nonbelievers need to here of. Beginning with the birth, and the preparation of Jesus, in chapters 1 and 2. Next we see Jesus’s message, his ministry, and the ways in which people begin to see him as the son of God, in chapter 2-12. Finally, in chapter 12-21 we see the death and resurrection of Jesus.
We see the book of john beginning with a quote from the beginning of Genesis “In the beginning was the word, and the word was with God, and the word was with God, and the word was God” John begins this way so that we must from the start ask ourselves whether or not his book is true, just plagiarizing scripture. So, than if we accept the authority of John and continue to read we begin to see the ministry of Jesus take place. John skips most of the early life of Jesus, and instead opts to give us an introduction to John the Baptist. This is for us to know that the coming of Jesus wasn’t just some enigma but something that had been prepared before his birth. Than Jesus is presented choosing his disciples, and the people he chose are shown to make you wonder why? The fact that Jesus chose those nobodies as his disciples makes it easier to prove that it had to be God through Jesus. Jesus’s first miracle follows this where he turns water into wine.
In the next part of his life, we see Nicodemus come to Jesus after he has done some more miracles, and Nicodemus questions Jesus about why he is doing these things, and who he is. It wouldn’t have been worth mentioning in the book of John except that in this conversation Jesus says in so many words that he is the son of God, and that all must be born again by accepting him into their lives. This encounter doesn’t include how Nicodemus responded to Jesus so he probably didn’t like what Jesus said. The rest of this section of John focuses on his miracles and almost everybody rejected him.
When we get to chapter 13 we finish seeing Jesus performing extravagant miracles and begins to teach his disciples some very important lessons. Beginning by him washing the feet of his disciples in his loin clothes after the Passover feast. Next, we see Jesus telling the disciples many things about who he is, and about the things that are to come. The rest of the book concerns itself with Jesus being betrayed and dying on the cross. But the story doesn’t stop there in chapter 20 he rises from the dead. He encounters the disciples fishing, having apparently abandoned his teaching after his death, only to again tell them to cast their nets on the other side; showing his forgiveness. The last thing we see happen in this book is Jesus talking to peter whom had denied him multiple times, leaving him in charge of the church, and according to some, making him the first pope.
The importance of the book of John can’t be understated except to say that we have Matthew, Mark, and Luke. The book of John shows us only the basic facts that serve to show Jesus as the one true son of God. In this book Jesus is most obviously God, the son of God, the savior of this world, the greatest teacher ever, or at the very least a great mastermind whose name has never been forgotten since the day his mother asked him to make wine from water. Drawing a convenient parallel between the beginning of Jesus’s ministry and a wedding day. We are having run out of wine to sustain us at the wedding feast Jesus comes to save us from the shame that would have followed.
