Real Faith Believes IN HIM

Introduction

I invite you to be turning in your Bibles to the book of John. John’s account of the life of Jesus. That’ll be our text this morning. And we will be almost exclusively in the Gospel of John. So just go ahead and get there and get comfortable there. And we’ll be looking at some things from that passage. We have many who are visiting with us today. We have those who are visiting with us right here from the Orlando area. And we certainly welcome you and invite you to join us again each and every time that we have the opportunity to come and study the Word of God. We’ll meet again this coming Wednesday at 7 o’clock for a period of Bible study. And then, of course, every Sunday from 9 to noon we meet for worship and for Bible study.

And if you’re in that nebulous uh area of the 20s and 30s as we call it, we’re having a class tonight that we do once a month of the 20s and 30s at 5 o’clock. That’ll be right out there in the classroom building, and you’re certainly welcome and invited to that too. It’ll be a good discussion, a good class, and we enjoy that time together. We have others who are visiting with us from across the country, and I know especially from the state of Alabama today, the brother who led us in prayer, Brother Chris Seagros is from the Gardendale Congregation. And it seems like half of the Garden Dale congregation is with us this morning. We welcome you and thank you for joining us. Hopefully there are a few saints left in Gardendale who can worship there this morning too.

Glad to have you with us. John 3 16, of course, is the passage that is known to really the whole world. Before I get there, I should have made mention that we’ve been focusing this month on the idea that faith does that, real faith does that. We had Brother Sewell Hall with us last week from Sunday to Wednesday, presented several excellent lessons, excellent studies about what real faith does. If you didn’t come out and listen to those, uh to hear Brother Hall, then I’d encourage you to go on our website, look at the videos, watch them, or you can listen to them. Be encouraged, be challenged, be stimulated to greater faithfulness as you look at what real faith does. But this morning I want to go just a little bit different direction, if you will.

Not to talk about what real faith does per se, but what real faith believes. And of course, as Brother Hall mentioned several times during the week, faith and belief are the same thing. But we want to just talk about though what faith believes about Jesus. And that real faith believes in him. The Gospel of John, of course, is significant in that, that over and over again you read about believing in him, or as Jesus would say himself, believing in me. And again, John 3 16, that well-known verse, for God so loved the world that he gave his only begotten Son, that whoever believes in him shall not perish, but have eternal life. Now, what does the writer mean by saying believe in him? Today in our culture, we might use that and kind of a choice.

You have all kinds of choices as to what you will believe in. You may believe in Muhammad. You might believe in Buddha. You might believe in any number of men who teach and preach. Or you might believe in Jesus. But that idea of just making a choice as to who you will believe in is foreign in the Gospel of John. John doesn’t ever give an alternate choice. He doesn’t say you could believe in Jesus or you could believe in Caesar. He doesn’t say you could believe in Jesus or you could believe in Zeus or Baal or any other God. Now, that choice is presented sometimes in the scriptures, particularly. The Old Testament, as God exhorts his people to believe in him, to not worship the idols.

But in the Gospel of John, there’s never a choice given believe in Jesus or believe in someone else. So it just says, believe in Jesus or don’t believe in Jesus. And the real idea about believing in him in the book of John is about believing in the real Jesus. Believing in who he really is. And that’s very relevant to our culture and time. Easter is only a couple of weeks away, hard to believe. And of course, many get a religious sentiment in their mind, and many think about Jesus. They think about the resurrection, but that’s also a prime time that you’ll see in various media outlets a challenge of the who the real Jesus is. This is where you often see on the covers of Newsweek and Time about who is the real Jesus.

And they’ll talk about a Jesus who lived in Galilee, but who was only a man and only taught some things and never claimed to be God. Well, a lot of people believe in that Jesus. But they don’t believe in him. Within the book of John, you have people who have some faith, have some notions of who Jesus is, but they are being encouraged to come to a deeper and fuller understanding of who Jesus is. Even there in John chapter 3, you remember what Nicodemus says about him in verse 2? We know, Rabbi, that you are a teacher and you’ve come from God. But Nicodemus does not yet fully understand who Jesus is. The woman at the well, the Samaritan woman at the well in John chapter 4, she would question Jesus.

Do you claim to be greater than our Father who gave us this well? She would also go on to say that I perceive that you are a prophet. But you need to have that faith in him graduate to a deeper and higher level. In John the 12th chapter, there were the rulers who, quote unquote, believed in Jesus, but they would not confess him. They were too afraid of the Pharisees. They loved the praise of men more than the praise of God. So they had some belief in Jesus, but they didn’t really believe in him. Even Jesus’ own apostles in John chapter 14 and verse 1, he says, You believe in God, believe also in me. This may strike us as weird. Of course, they believed in him.

1. He Is Deity

They’ve been following him for three years. But they need to come to fully understand who he is. To really believe in him. So as we look at faith this morning, what real faith is. Well, of course, for the Christian, real faith is in him. It is believing in him. And so, first of all, we need to establish who he is. To do that, we’re going to go to John the first chapter. John the first chapter, of course, a passage known to many in this preamble or prologue to the writing of who Jesus is and his life. John gives testimony of several things regarding the very nature of Jesus. Of course, in the first two verses, we have the simple matter established that he is deity. In the beginning was the word.

And the word was with God, and the word was God. He was in the beginning with God. We’ll just take a side note here. There’s no justification in this text whatsoever. To claim as Jehovah’s Witnesses or other groups would that he is a God or he was a created God, that is not found within this text and is not permitted in this text. The text echoes, of course, what the beginning of the whole Bible states. In the beginning, God created. Well, here John says, in the beginning was the word. The word was God or is God, and the word was with God. Even that very nature of the word being with God proclaims his deity. You go throughout the Old Testament, and you see of those who had come into the presence of God, you recognize they cannot remain in the presence of God for long.

Those who even have a vision of God, how humbled they are, and they must fall down at his feet, and they’re wondering about their own lives. Can they be permitted to live? Moses who longs to see God yet he cannot see his face. They cannot behold the glory of God. And yet the word who is God, he was with God. He was in the very presence of God. He shares the very nature of God. He is there with him in doing all things. It is a bold statement that John begins with by simply saying, In the beginning, the beginning of all things, there was already the word. He is God, he was with God. And then he goes on. What he’s saying, though, is if you’re going to have faith in him, you’ve got to believe this first.

2. He Is the Source of Life

When we’re talking about the word, and of course we’ll establish later on that the word is Jesus as he came down into this into this world. He is deity. He is God. Make no mistake about it. He’s the source of life, verses 3 through 5. All things came into being through him, and apart from him, nothing came into being that has come into being. Again, echoing Genesis chapter 1, how all things were created in six days. Going from light, the firmament, the seas being created, and dry land, vegetation, the stars of the sky, the sun and the moon, the fish and the birds, and then mammals, and then finally, of course, mankind himself. And God saying, Let us make man in our image. Nothing was created except through him.

He is the source of life of all things. There was nothing created that was not created in him. That is echoed time and again throughout the scriptures. Paul makes mention of that in Colossians chapter 1. The Hebrew writer, maybe even the same Paul, being in Hebrews chapter 1 and verse 2, that he created all things. Life comes from him. He is the originator of it. But then he goes on in verses 3 and 4. I’m sorry, verses 4 and 5. In him was life. And the life was the light of men. The light shines in the darkness, and the darkness did not comprehend it. There we have a different focus about life. It is no longer simply just a matter of that, yes, physical life was created through him, but in him was life.

And again, that may even take us back to Genesis chapter 1, when God breathed life into man. And how man lived while he was in the presence of God. But he was told, in the day that you eat of this fruit, in the day that you sin and transgress against God, you will surely die. We’re not just talking about physical life anymore, are we? We’re talking about life itself. We’re talking about real and true life, that existence with God, and that life is in him. He is also the light of men. So the light shines in the darkness, and the darkness did not comprehend it. The better translation may be the darkness did not overcome it. He came into a dark world, and that contrast is going to be giving again later on in verse 9 following.

3. The Word Became Flesh

How many love darkness. But he came with light. He came to bring light to man to show them the way, to point them to God. And the darkness, even though it seemed like it was triumphant, yet it could not overcome it. Could not overwhelm it. The light was still there. Life and light came through him. If you’re going to believe in Jesus, John is saying, here’s what you must believe. He is deity, and he is a source of life. He goes on further in verses 14 through 15. The word became flesh and dwelt among us. And we saw his glory, glory as in the only begotten from the Father, full of grace and truth. And John testified about him and cried out, saying, This was he of whom I said, he who comes after me has a higher rank than I, for he existed before me.

Again, much needless controversy has come about about the matter of he became flesh, he ceased being God. The very text will not allow that. Because what do they behold? They saw his glory. Glory as of the only begotten from the Father, full of grace and truth. Again, that attribute of glory being that of God Himself. And so what John is saying here is even though he became flesh, yet we still saw in him the glory of God. That he was the one who was full of grace and truth. And we beheld that. He did not cease being deity. Yes, he emptied himself, as Paul says in Philippians chapter 2. But the idea of he left the glory of heaven. He did not cling or grasp the equality that he had with God, but he humbled himself and became man so that he could even die on the cross for our sins.

And by the way, when John says that the word became flesh, he’s not simply drawing our attention to the fact that he lived here on the earth as a man. He’s drawing our attention to the very fact that he left heaven to be here on the earth. When he became flesh, that was so he could dwell here. And John is saying, we beheld him. We saw him, we knew him, and we could see in him the grace and truth of the Father, the very glory of God. If you’re going to believe in the real Jesus, and this is what you’ve got to believe. He is deity.

4. The Fullness of God’s Grace

For of his fullness we have all received in grace upon grace. For the law was given through Moses, grace and truth were realized through Jesus Christ. No one has seen God any time, the only begotten God who is in the bosom of the Father, he has explained him. The law of Moses had grace. There’s no doubt about it. Any of the promises of God are a matter of God’s grace. Even as we were studying this morning at 9 o’clock from Psalm 36, and the very loving kindness of God, the steadfast love of God, which reaches to the heavens, the steadfast love of God, which is precious, the steadfast love of God, the psalmists ask in prayer that it would continue to be exhibited to his people.

That is a matter of God’s grace. But the point of John saying this is not that there was no grace in the law of Moses, but law, by its nature, of course, also condemns. Law points out here is sin, here is fault, you stand in need. And so God provided grace upon grace, the culmination of all in his son. That now we experience grace through him. And again, it points back to the very fact that he came from God. The only reason, the only way that he can be the full manifestation and source of God’s grace is that he has come and revealing the Father to us. And only one who is with God could do that. So this is the simplified message that John has.

5. He Can Give Life

Here he is from the old set. He’s going to go on to explain about Jesus’ life on this earth, but as he begins, here is the one I’m talking about. He is deity, he is the source of life. He came to earth, and he is the fullness of God’s grace. Now, there are implications to all four. And there are very real implications to what it means to have faith in him. If this is who he is, if this is the Jesus presented by John in the Gospels, and there are real implications of what it means to believe in him. It means, first of all, of course, that you believe that he can give life. If he is the very source of life, then he can give life.

And there’s life to be found in none other. This, of course, is found throughout the book of John. Just go with me a little tour of the book of John. Of course, John 3 and verse 16, we’ve already read that whoever believes in him shall not perish, but have eternal life. And the fourth chapter, as he’s speaking to the woman at the well, he says to the Samaritan woman in verses 13 and 14 of John chapter 4, that everyone who drinks of this water, that is this physical, this earthly water, will thirst again. But whoever drinks of the water that I will give him shall never thirst. But the water that I will give him will become in him a well of water, springing up to eternal life.

Here is why I am offering you not literal water, but a fountain of living water that’ll spring up in you to eternal life. In the sixth chapter, after Jesus had fed the five thousand, on the next day the people are seeking him again. And Jesus knows why they are seeking him again. They were filled with the loaves, and now they are coming looking for this earthly physical blessing once again. And he says to them that you need to take of me. I am the real bread. And so he says in John 6 and verse 35, I am the bread of life. He who comes to me will not hunger, and he who believes in me will never thirst. Skipping down to verse 40, this is the will of my Father, that everyone who beholds the Son and believes in him will have eternal life.

And I myself will raise him up on the last day. If you’re going to believe in Jesus and you’re going to believe that he is the one, and he is the only one from whom life comes. The seventh chapter, on the day of the feast of Booths, in verses 37 and 38, we read this at our 9 o’clock hour. When Jesus cried out at that feast day on that occasion, if anyone is thirsty, let him come to me and drink. And he who believes in me, as the scripture said, from his innermost being will flow rivers of living water. And finally, in the 11th chapter, and we’re going through all these for a reason, because we’re going to come back to a few of them. In the 11th chapter, and perhaps most significantly in verse 25 and 26, after Lazarus had died, and Jesus had on purpose delayed his coming.

And he is speaking to Martha, and they’re all saying, Lord, if you had been here, my brother would not have died. Jesus responded to her in verse 25. I am the resurrection, the life. He who believes in me will live, even if he dies. And everyone who lives and believes in me will never die. Do you believe this? Wouldn’t Jesus ask us the same question today? Do you believe this? Do you really believe in me? Believe in me so much that you have the assurance that even though your physical life may end, yet you will live. Do you believe in me so much that you would recognize that I am the cure for spiritual death? And if you’ll really believe in me, you will never die.

6. He Can Take You to Heaven

Not that we would never die physically, because there were certainly, well, all of Jesus’ apostles died physically, but that you would never die, never be separated from God. Would you believe in him? And you’re coming to him and believing him that life only exists in him. And he is the one that can give you life. Belief in Jesus is not a negative thing. Belief in Jesus is inherently a positive thing. That you have come to the one and true and only Savior, and the one who can make you live. If you believe in this Jesus, then since he came to earth, you would also believe that he can take you to heaven. That’s the point of his statement in John chapter 14 and verse 1. Do not let your heart be troubled.

Believe in God, or you believe in God, believe also in me in my Father’s house.

If it were not so, I would have told you. For I go, that idea is found throughout the book of John as well. He came, he became flesh. He dwelt here on the earth, but throughout the book also he speaks of going away, going back to the Father. Well, why was he going back? Why must he leave here if he became flesh? If I go and prepare a place for you, I’ll come again and receive you to myself. That where I am, there you may be also. And you know the way where I’m going. If you believe in this Jesus, that yes, he existed in the very form of God, he is God, he dwelt with God, and yet he came here and lived as a man, became flesh, then you also believe in this Jesus is the one who invites you to be turning in your Bibles to the book of John.

John’s account of the life of Jesus. That’ll be our text this morning. And we will be almost exclusively in the Gospel of John. So just go ahead and get there and get comfortable there. We’ll be looking at some things from that passage. We have many who are visiting with us today. We have those who are visiting with us right here from the Orlando area. And we certainly welcome you and invite you to join us again each and every time that we have the opportunity to come and study the Word of God. We’ll meet again this coming Wednesday at 7 o’clock for a period of Bible study. And then, of course, every Sunday from 9 to noon, we meet for worship and for Bible study. And if you’re in that nebulous uh area of the 20s and 30s, as we call it, we’re having a class tonight that we do once a month of the 20s and 30s at 5 o’clock.

That’ll be right out there in the classroom building, and you’re certainly welcome and invited to that too. It’ll be a good discussion, a good class, and we enjoy that time together. We have others who are visiting with us from across the country, and I know especially from the state of Alabama today, the brother who led us in prayer, Brother Chris Seagros is from the Gardendale congregation, and it seems like half of the Gardendale congregation is with us this morning. We welcome you and thank you for joining us. Hopefully there are a few saints left in Gardendale who can worship there this morning too. Glad to have you with us. John 3 16, of course, is the passage that is known to really the whole world. Before I get there, I should have made mention that we’ve been focusing this month on the idea that faith does that.

Real faith does that. We had Brother Sewell Hall with us last week from Sunday to Wednesday, presented several excellent lessons, excellent studies about what real faith does. If you didn’t come out and listen to those, or to hear Brother Hall, then I’d encourage you to go on our website, look at the videos, watch them, or you can listen to them. Be encouraged, be challenged, be stimulated to greater faithfulness as you look at what real faith does. But this morning I want to go just a little bit different direction, if you will. Not talk about what real faith does per se, but what real faith believes. And of course, as Brother Hall mentioned several times during the week, faith and belief are the same thing. We want to just talk about though what faith believes about Jesus.

And that real faith believes in him. The Gospel of John, of course, is significant in that, and that over and over again you read about believing in him, or as Jesus would say himself, believing in me. And again, John 3.16, that well-known verse, for God so loved the world that he gave his only begotten son, that whoever believes in him shall not perish, but have eternal life. Now, what does the writer mean by saying believe in him? Today in our culture, we might use that and kind of a choice. You have all kinds of choices as to what you will believe in. You may believe in Muhammad. You might believe in Buddha. You might believe in any number of men who teach and preach. Or you might believe in Jesus.

But that idea of just making a choice as to who you will believe in is foreign in the Gospel of John. John doesn’t forget ever give an alternate choice. He doesn’t say you could believe in Jesus or you could believe in Caesar. He doesn’t say you could believe in Jesus or you could believe in Zeus or Baal or any other God. Now, that choice is presented sometimes in the scriptures, particularly Old Testament is God exhorts his people to believe in him, to not worship the idols. But in the Gospel of John, there’s never a choice given believe in Jesus or believe in someone else. No, it just says, believe in Jesus or don’t believe in Jesus. And the real idea about believing in him in the book of John is about believing in the real Jesus.

Believing in who he really is. And that’s very relevant to our culture in time. Easter is only a couple of weeks away, hard to believe. And of course, many get a religious sentiment in their mind, and many think about Jesus. They think about the resurrection, but that’s also a prime time that you’ll see in various media outlets, a challenge of who the real Jesus is. This is where you often see on the covers of Newsweek and Time about who is the real Jesus. And they’ll talk about a Jesus who lived in Galilee, but who was only a man and only taught some things and never claimed to be God. Well, a lot of people believe in that Jesus. But they don’t believe in him. Within the book of John, you have people who have some faith, have some notions of who Jesus is, but they are being encouraged to come to a deeper and fuller understanding of who Jesus is.

Even there in John chapter 3, you remember what Nicodemus says about him in verse 2? We know, Rabbi, that you are a teacher and you’ve come from God. But Nicodemus does not yet fully understand who Jesus is. The woman at the well, the Samaritan woman at the well in John chapter 4, she would question Jesus. Do you claim to be greater than our Father who gave us this well? She would also go on to say that I perceive that you are a prophet. But you need to have that faith in him graduate to a deeper and higher level. In John the twelfth chapter, there were the rulers who, quote unquote, believed in Jesus, but they would not confess him. They were too afraid of the Pharisees.

They loved the praise of men more than the praise of God. So they had some belief in Jesus, but they didn’t really believe in him. Even Jesus’ own apostles in John chapter 14 and verse 1, he says, You believe in God, believe also in me. This may strike us as we of course they believed in him. They’ve been following him for three years. But they need to come to fully understand who he is. To really believe in him. So as we look at faith this morning, what real faith is. Well, of course, for the Christian, real faith is in him. It is believing in him. And so, first of all, we need to establish who he is. To do that, we’re going to go to John the first chapter.

John the first chapter, of course, is a passage known to many in this preamble or prologue to the writing of who Jesus is and his life. John gives testimony of several things regarding the very nature of Jesus. Of course, in the first two verses, we have the simple matter established that he is deity. In the beginning was the Word. And the Word was with God, and the Word was God. He was in the beginning with God. We’ll just take a side note here. There’s no justification in this text whatsoever. To claim, as Jehovah’s Witnesses or other groups would, that he is a God or he was a created God, that is not found within this text and is not permitted in this text. The text echoes, of course, what the beginning of the whole Bible states.

In the beginning, God created. Well, here John says, in the beginning was the word. The word was God or is God, and the Word was with God. Even that very nature of the Word being with God proclaims his deity. You go throughout the Old Testament, and you see of those who would come into the presence of God, you recognize they cannot remain in the presence of God for long. Those who even have a vision of God, how humble they are, and they must fall down at his feet, and they’re wondering about their own lives. Can they be permitted to live? Moses who longs to see God, and yet he cannot see his face. They cannot behold the glory of God. And yet the Word who is God, he was with God.

He was in the very presence of God. He shares the very nature of God. He is there with him in doing all things. It is a bold statement that John begins with by simply saying, In the beginning, the beginning of all things, there was already the word. He was with God. And then he goes on. What he’s saying, though, is if you’re going to have faith in him, you’ve got to believe this first. When we’re talking about the word, and of course we’ll establish later on that the word is Jesus as he came down into this into this world. He is deity. He is God. Make no mistake about it. He’s the source of life, verses 3 through 5. All things came into being through him, and apart from him, nothing came into being that has come into being.

Again, echoing Genesis chapter 1, how all things were created in six days. Going from light, the firmament, the seas being created in dry land, vegetation, the stars of the sky, the sun and the moon, the fish and the birds, and then mammals, and then finally, of course, mankind himself. And God saying, Let us make man in our image. Nothing was created except through him. He is the source of life of all things. There was nothing created that was not created in him. That is echoed time and again throughout the scriptures. Paul makes mention of that in Colossians chapter 1. The Hebrew writer, maybe even the same Paul, being in Hebrews chapter 1 and verse 2, that he created all things. Life comes from him. He is the originator of it.

But then he goes on in verses 3 and 4. I’m sorry, verses 4 and 5. In him was life. And life was the light of men. The light shines in the darkness, and the darkness did not comprehend it. There we have a different focus about life. It is no longer simply just a matter of that, yes, physical life was created through him, but in him was life. And again, that may even take us back to Genesis chapter 1, when God breathed life into man. And how man lived while he was in the presence of God. But he was told in the day that you eat of this fruit, and the day that you sinned transgressed against God, you will surely die. We’re not just talking about physical life anymore, are we?

We’re talking about life itself. We’re talking about real and true life, that existence with God, and that life is in him.

He is also the light of men. So the light shines in the darkness, and the darkness did not comprehend it. The better translation may be the darkness did not overcome it. He came into a dark world, and that contrast is going to be giving again later on in verse 9 following. How many love darkness. But he came with light. He came to bring light to man, to show them the way, to point them to God. And the darkness, even though it seemed like it was triumphant, yet it could not overcome it. Could not overwhelm it. The light was still there. Life and light came through him. If you’re going to believe in Jesus, John is saying, here’s what you must believe. He is deity, and he is a source of life.

He goes on further in verses 14 through 15. The word became flesh and dwelt among us. And we saw his glory, glory as of the only begotten from the Father, full of grace and truth. And John testified about him and cried out, saying, This was he of whom I said, He who comes after me has a higher rank than I, for he existed before me. Again, much needless controversy has come about about the matter of he became flesh, did he ceased being God. The very text will not allow that. Because what do they behold? They saw his glory. Glory as of the only begotten from the Father, full of grace and truth. Again, that attribute of glory being that of God Himself. And so what John is saying here is even though he became flesh, yet we still saw in him the glory of God.

That he was the one who was full of grace and truth. And we beheld that.

Yes, he emptied himself, as Paul says in Philippians chapter 2. But the idea of he left the glory of heaven. He did not cling or grasp the equality that he had with God, but he humbled himself and became man so that he could even die on the cross for our sins. And by the way, when John says that the word became flesh, he’s not simply drawing our attention to the fact that he lived here on the earth as a man. He’s drawing our attention to the very fact that he left heaven to be here on the earth. When he became flesh, that was so he could dwell here. And John is saying, we beheld him. We saw him, we knew him, and we could see in him the grace and truth of the Father, the very glory of God.

If you’re going to believe in the real Jesus, and this is what you’ve got to believe. He is the source of all life.

For of his fullness we have all received.