Today, I am reading and commenting on John 19-21.

Every time I read this passage since it was pointed out to me that Jesus asked Peter if he loved Him one time for each time Peter denied Him, I have been moved by that fact.  This reflects the ways in which God gives us opportunity to reconcile with Him after we deny Him.  When Peter denied Jesus before His crucifixion, he did so with greater vehemence each time, until he broke his own heart with his denial out of fear.  Here, Jesus asked Peter if he loved Him three times, with Peter answering in the positive with greater vehemence each time.  The final time he did so with such vehemence that it stuck into his soul.  Peter denied Jesus three times, yet Jesus called him to feed His sheep.  No matter how we have failed God in the past, He still has a job for us going forward.  Despite Peter’s failure, God called him to be a leader in the Church.  You may think your failures, your sins, mean that God will not use you for anything important.  That is not true.  God has something important for each of us to do, even if we have failed Him in the past (or, more likely, we think we have failed Him).  Do not let your past failures, your past sins, stop you from listening to God and following His call going forward.

I use the daily Bible reading schedule from “The Bible.net” for my daily Bible reading.

I have created a Patreon page for those who would like to support me in writing these blog posts every day: https://patreon.com/AttilaSoldus

Today, I am reading and commenting on John 17-18.

I am going to start off with the end of the passage where Jesus told Pilate that the reason He was born and came into the world was to testify to the truth and that everyone who is of the truth listens to Him.  Pilate replied by asking, “What is truth?” indicating that he did not believe there was such a thing as truth.  Now I want to go back to the beginning of today’s passage where Jesus prayed for His disciples, and for those who believed in Him because of what His disciples said about Him.  As I write about this, keep in mind that exchange between Jesus and Pilate.  In His prayer, Jesus asks the Father to sanctify those He gave to Him out of the world by the truth.  He also says that glory has come to Him through them (let us strive to live our lives so that glory may come to Jesus through us).   He then says that He has given us the glory that the Father had given Him so that we may be one, just as He and the Father are one.  He continues to speak in that prayer how those who believe in Him and have accepted the words He spoke were in the world, but not of the world.  He reminds us that the world hates us because we have accepted the truth which He spoke.  Jesus does not ask the Father to take us out of the world, but to protect us from the Evil One.  Note that Jesus does not ask the Father to protect us from the world, but from the Evil One, the one who wishes to deny that truth even exists.  Which brings me back to that exchange between Jesus and Pilate.  Pilate represents the parts of the world which want to pretend that they do not hate God, but, in order to reject His word, claims that truth isn’t really a thing.  We on the other hand are called to be one with each other and with Jesus and therefore to testify to the truth.  The Evil One will try to convince us that truth is not really a thing and that each of us can have our own truth.  The Truth is Jesus Christ, as He said in yesterday’s passage.  As we believe in Him and testify about Him, we will come to recognize other truths, truths which will point people towards Him.

Jesus Christ is The Truth.  If we believe in Him, we will understand that all other truth derives from Him, and that as we acknowledge those small “t” truths they will point us to Him.   The world seeks to deny small ‘t” truths because the Evil One knows that as people acknowledge those truths they will be brought to the One who is the capital “T” Truth.

I use the daily Bible reading schedule from “The Bible.net” for my daily Bible reading.

I have created a Patreon page for those who would like to support me in writing these blog posts every day: https://patreon.com/AttilaSoldus

Today, I am reading and commenting on John 14-16.

I am struggling with writing today’s blog because there are so many interconnections between the different topics which John covers in today’s passage and I am having trouble pulling out the thread I want to write about.  I am going to start with where Jesus says that we need to remember that if the world hates us that it hated Him first.  He explains that by repeating that a servant is not greater than his master.  Since Jesus is our master, we are less than Him.  Therefore, if the world persecuted Him (and it did), it will persecute us.  Further, Jesus explains that if we belonged to the world it would love us, but since He has chosen and claimed us as His, the world hates us.  We, as followers of Christ, need to stop blaming ourselves for the world hating us.  I often hear Christians say, “Well, people hate Christians because we do ‘X’.”  Do not say that unless you consider yourself guilty of doing “X”, and “X” is something which God does not command us to do.

I am going to give an example of one of the things which people claim is a problem with Christians.  People often say that Christians turn them off to Christianity because they are too judgmental.  While there are those who claim* to be Christians who judgmental, most of the time Christians are condemned for being judgmental because they declare things to be true.  Jesus tells us earlier in this passage that He is the Truth, the Way, and the Life.  By doing so, He declares that there is Truth, and that the way to that Truth is through Him.  If we, or anyone else, denies truth they will not find the way to life.  If we love them, we must call them to truth, and to Truth.  Those who have rejected Truth will hate us for that and call us judgmental for insisting that there is truth.  But if we love them, we cannot stop pointing them to the truth because we will want them to live.

There is so much more to be written about this, but I am going to stop here.

*I say “claim” here because being judgmental** is an indicator that one is not in a right relationship with Christ.  I am unable to say one way or the other whether those persons are Christian, since only God truly knows what is in their heart.

**Judgmental is a subjective word.  Some people are called judgmental simply because they speak a truth which others do not wish to hear.  We are called to judge between Truth and falsehood, but none of us knows who has rejected Christ while claiming to follow Him and who is struggling to faithfully follow Him but fall to temptation.

I use the daily Bible reading schedule from “The Bible.net” for my daily Bible reading.

I have created a Patreon page for those who would like to support me in writing these blog posts every day: https://patreon.com/AttilaSoldus

Today, I am reading and commenting on John 12-13.

The part of this passage where a group of “Greeks” requested to see Jesus seems odd to me. (I am not sure if John means “Gentiles” or “Hellenized Jews” when he writes “Greeks” here, probably the latter).  So, here is what John tells us: a group of Greeks came to Philip with a request to see Jesus.  Philip takes that request to Andrew, then he and Andrew take the request to Jesus.  Then Jesus talks about how His hour has come.  We never learn if the Greeks got their audience with Jesus.  John never explains the connection between what Jesus said and the Greeks requesting to see Him.  Actually, writing that makes me wonder if perhaps my default reading that John meant Hellenized Jews is wrong.  Perhaps, the connection has to do with the idea, which I am not convinced of, that during Jesus’ earthly ministry, His message was directed solely at those who followed the Law of Moses (Jews and Samaritans*), while His death began His message being directed to all people.

In any case, the request from the Greeks to see Him triggered Jesus to declare that His hour to be glorified had come.  He begins by saying, “…unless a kernel of wheat falls to the ground and dies, it remains only a single seed. But if it dies, it produces many seeds. ”  We frequently read this as being directed at us as His followers, and we are not wrong to do so.  However, I also believe that He was saying that He had to die in order to produce followers who were transformed to be like Him by the Holy Spirit.  Now, as I said, this also applies to us as He explained in the next bit.  We must be willing to lose our life, and the things of this world which we value, in order to gain the life which God offers through Jesus.  What Jesus is saying here follows up on what I wrote about yesterday.  The members of the Sanhedrin tried to preserve what they had, and as a result, they lost it.  Jesus’ disciples (except for Judas Iscariot), on the other hand, gave up all that they desired in this world in order to obtain the life Jesus offered them.  Finally, Jesus told us that those who wish to serve Him need to follow Him.  He said this as the beginning of the week which would end with His crucifixion.  If we wish to serve Christ, we must follow Him to the cross.  We need to accept that following and serving Him may lead to us being tortured and killed, not just accept, but embrace that.  Not everyone who serves Christ will find that end, but everyone who serves Him must be willing and eager to do so.  If that day comes for me I am not sure I am able to eagerly embrace it.  I pray that God will give me the grace to do so if He leads me there.

I was going to end there, but one more thing hit me as I began to write my title for today’s blog.  Christ was lifted up, then put into the ground, and as a result He produced many seeds.  Many of His followers(those seeds) since then have died and produced even more seeds.  This reminds us that persecution of Christians in an effort to get rid of Christians is always counter-productive.  As an example, Europe was once a safe haven for those who followed Christ, and the Church in Europe has almost died.  Europe today is hostile to Christianity, yet the Church in Europe is seeing signs of growing for the first time in what is probably a century.

*Samaritans interpreted the Law of Moses differently from the Jews, but would almost certainly have claimed that temple worship was a distortion of the Law of Moses (at least, that is what I understand from what I have read about Samaritans, both in the Bible and elsewhere).

I use the daily Bible reading schedule from “The Bible.net” for my daily Bible reading.

I have created a Patreon page for those who would like to support me in writing these blog posts every day: https://patreon.com/AttilaSoldus

Today, I am reading and commenting on John 8-9.

I have loved the story of the man born blind which John recounts here.  When the Pharisees questioned the man the second time about how he was healed, they began by saying that the man needed to keep in mind as he told them how he was healed that they knew that Jesus was a sinner.  The man born blind gave a great summation of faith.  Which I will paraphrase thus, “I am not a learned man, so I can’t debate with you about whether He is a sinner.  All I know is that I was blind and now I see.”  When we look at our lives, we need to keep it simple.  When people try to make things complicated, keep it simple.  Rather than worrying about what we do not know, let us focus on what we do know.  When someone claims that Christianity is flawed because of “X”, and you do not know how to answer.  Take your time, focus on what you do know about Christ, and say, “I do not know about that.  Let me look into it and get back to you.”  Then, pray for God’s guidance, study Scripture, speak to those who have studied Scripture, and pray some more.  And do all of this humbly.  The man born blind was humble.  He admitted that he did not know whether Jesus was a sinner, but pointed out that if Jesus was not from God, He couldn’t do the things He had done.

In his wrap up of the story, John tells us that Jesus said that He had come into the world so that the blind may see and those that see become blind.  Some of the Pharisees who were present asked if that meant that they were blind.  To which Jesus replied, “If you were blind, you would not be guilty of sin; but now that you claim you can see, your guilt remains.”  The man born blind humbly admitted that he did not know and that Jesus had given him his sight.  The Pharisees arrogantly claimed that they knew, and Jesus declared that that made them blind.  It reminds me of a Christian apologist I occasionally watch videos of.  On several occasions people have asked them if such and such a person is in heaven, of is going to heaven.  He always answers that he does not know, God is the one who makes that decision and he, the apologist, does not know what that person thinks and believes (or thought and believed) in their heart. that they might be truly repentant for any terrible deeds which they committed.  He neither says that he thinks they are saved nor that they are not.  The apologist humbly admits that he only knows that he himself has declared that Jesus is Lord and repented of his sins, and thus God has forgiven him.  We are not responsible for what other people decide to do with Christ, we are just responsible for turning to Him ourselves and telling others about Him.

I use the daily Bible reading schedule from “The Bible.net” for my daily Bible reading.

I have created a Patreon page for those who would like to support me in writing these blog posts every day: https://patreon.com/AttilaSoldus

Today, I am reading and commenting on John 6-7.

I had an idea about what I was going to write about today, but as I started to write it was not coming together.  So, I read through the passage several times trying to figure out how to get it to work.  As I was doing so, I came across Jesus saying this, “Anyone who chooses to do the will of God will find out whether my teaching comes from God or whether I speak on my own.”  Notice how Jesus places this.  He does not say that if you listen to His teaching and do what He says you will be doing God’s will.  He says that if you choose to do God’s will, you will realize that Jesus’ teachings come from God.  This reminds me of what Paul writes in Romans chapter 1. There he says that people are without excuse because God’s qualities are evident from creation.  If we truly seek to do God’s will, if we truly seek to know God, we will see that what Jesus teaches is from God.  God gave us minds for a reason.  We can apply what Jesus says here to other people who claim to preach God’s word.  If they seek their own glory and to gain for themselves, they are not from God.  On the other hand, if they seek to bring glory to God, than they are speaking God’s message.  Jesus did not seek power and glory.  Instead He washed His disciples feet and sacrificed Himself for all of mankind.

I use the daily Bible reading schedule from “The Bible.net” for my daily Bible reading.

I have created a Patreon page for those who would like to support me in writing these blog posts every day: https://patreon.com/AttilaSoldus

Today, I am reading and commenting on John 4-5.

I am currently in the middle of taking a course designed to empower the entire body of the Christian Church to missions.  So, when I read what Jesus said to His disciples after speaking to the Samaritan woman at the well, it really struck me.  After saying the phrase which I used as my title today, Jesus told His disciples that He had sent them to reap, to harvest, a crop for eternal life.  Further, He tells them that He sent them to harvest the crops that another had sown.  I see this as explaining why we see the Apostles and other disciples primarily preaching the Gospel to Jews and Samaritans at the beginning of the Book of Acts, and only see a major outreach to the Gentiles after Paul’s conversion.  Jesus sent His disciples first to harvest souls for eternal life from among the Jews and Samaritans, whom others (Himself, John the Baptist, and unnamed others) had sown the good news about the kingdom of God.

The other thing which I see fortuitously is when Jesus is speaking to the royal official whose son was sick.  When the official begs Jesus to come and heal his son, Jesus replies, “Unless you people see signs and wonders, you will never believe.”  The official’s reply is essentially, “I just want my son to live.”  Jesus then heals the boy and sends the official on his way.  Note that the boy was not present and the official did not learn until he was on his way home that his son was healed.  The reason this struck me is that I have been watching videos of Christian apologists debating Muslims and one of the things which come up is that the Koran says that Mohammed did not perform miracles because previous prophets had performed signs yet people did not believe them.  Here Jesus pointed out that people refused to believe without more signs, even though He had already performed signs for them.  Yet, He healed the official’s son.  Further, at the beginning of this section of the Book of John, John told us that Jesus had already said about the area this takes place in that a prophet was without honor in his own country (which this was).  Jesus continued to perform miracles despite the overall lack of faith. 

Which leads me to a final point, which I consider related: one thing which I have struggled with is why we do not see more miracles in the modern Church.  One point I made is that maybe we do see them and fail to recognize them, or, perhaps, they are not well publicized.  Shortly after I formulated that thought and began praying that God would open my eyes to see His power miraculously displayed, while watching videos of Christian apologists, I heard Wes Huff tell the story about how he recovered from an autoimmune induced paralysis in a way which his (non-believing) doctors called miraculous (If you want more information I am sure an internet search based on those search terms will yield a video where he describes that).  Then, over this past weekend, I was watching another Christian apologist who mentioned two people who had clearly documented recoveries from disabilities in ways which modern medical science cannot explain.  Those two people were Bruce Van Natta and Marlene Klepees.  While I am confident that these will not convince those who are skeptical of the possibility of miracles, they are well enough documented to overcome my skepticism of most miracle stories (which comes from the number of charlatans who claim miraculous powers in order to profit).

I use the daily Bible reading schedule from “The Bible.net” for my daily Bible reading.

I have created a Patreon page for those who would like to support me in writing these blog posts every day: https://patreon.com/AttilaSoldus