John’s Gospel begins with the eternal Word who is God [1:1,14] and says that the Word was made flesh and dwelt among us and we beheld His glory.
John and others saw His glory as He said and did wonderful things. With God’s help we too can see His glory as we examine the Gospel of John.
The Word is God’s logos or logic and is Jesus Christ [1:17] and He is making His deity known by what He says and by what He does.
Jesus, says John the Baptist, is the Lamb of God who takes away the sin of the world [1:29]. John the Baptist identifies Jesus as the Christ with the sign that God said would be given, that of the Spirit of God descending like a dove, and remaining on Him [1:32]. What that means is that the OT sacrificial system is gone forever. No longer are there types and shadows of the atonement of Christ, He is here! The Old Covenant is gone and the New Covenant is revealed.
Jesus began His public ministry at a wedding in Cana where He performed His first miracle by turning water into wine [2:1-10]. This first miracle [2:11] links Jesus with the statement in 1:3 that He is the Creator.
Jesus then goes to the temple in Jerusalem and throws out the moneychangers who had made His Father’s house a den of thieves [2:13-16]. In cleansing the temple He fulfills the prophecy of Zechariah 14:21 that there would be no Canaanite [merchant] in the temple.
He also fulfills Psalm 69:9, “Zeal for Your house has eaten Me up!”
As we continue in John’s Gospel it is my hope to show you many more OT types and prophecies that Jesus fulfilled as He walked in this sinful world in sovereign majesty and did the works of God the Father who sent Him!
In Chapter 3 Jesus has an encounter with Nicodemus the Pharisee and Jesus tells Nicodemus that religion alone cannot save you. “You must be born again.”
Jesus declares that He is the subject of the new birth as He reminds Nicodemus of Ezekiel’s “clean water” and “new heart” [Ez. 36:24-27].
Ezekiel preached about regeneration or the new birth. God told Ezekiel that He would gather His people from the nations [Gentiles].
So in order to demonstrate that Jesus is the Savior of the world, i.e., non-Jews [nations], as well as the elect remnant of the Jews, Jesus keeps a divine appointment with a Samaritan woman at Jacob’s Well. She not only represents Samaria but the “nations” also.
This woman is at the other extreme of the social strata from the Pharisee.
After a discussion of the nature of true worship [On this mountain or in Jerusalem? Spirit and Truth]. That settles forever the matter of a rebuilt temple and a renewal of animal sacrifices.
Jesus then gives the “living water” to the Samaritan woman as He reveals Himself to her “the gift of God, the Messiah who was to come.
It is of utmost importance that you understand that both the moral and religious Pharisee and the immoral and superstitious Samaritan woman were saved in exactly the same way.
The Pharisee was not good enough that he did not need to be born again and the Samaritan woman was not so bad that she was beyond the mercy of God. Both were born again by the Spirit of God.
If you can grasp the truth that virtually shouts out in this comparison of the Pharisee with this outcast woman you will be a long way to understanding the meaning of grace. There is no merit in the goodness of the Pharisee and there is no disqualification in the badness of the woman!
Anything else is not grace!
We are all leveled at the foot of the cross!
Let’s continue with John Chapter 4.
John 4: 43-54
43 Now after the two days He departed from there and went to Galilee.
44 For Jesus Himself testified that a prophet has no honor in his own country.
45 So when He came to Galilee, the Galileans received Him, having seen all the things He did in Jerusalem at the feast; for they also had gone to the feast.
46 So Jesus came again to Cana of Galilee where He had made the water wine. And there was a certain nobleman whose son was sick at Capernaum.
47 When he heard that Jesus had come out of Judea into Galilee, he went to Him and implored Him to come down and heal his son, for he was at the point of death.
48 Then Jesus said to him, "Unless you people see signs and wonders, you will by no means believe."
49 The nobleman said to Him, "Sir, come down before my child dies!"
50 Jesus said to him, "Go your way; your son lives." So the man believed the word that Jesus spoke to him, and he went his way.
51 And as he was now going down, his servants met him and told him, saying, "Your son lives!"
52 Then he inquired of them the hour when he got better. And they said to him, "Yesterday at the seventh hour the fever left him."
53 So the father knew that it was at the same hour in which Jesus said to him, "Your son lives." And he himself believed, and his whole household.
54 This again is the second sign Jesus did when He had come out of Judea into Galilee.
Do you remember learning about the prejudice that the Jerusalem Jews held for their “country cousins” from up in Galilee?
Nathanael asked Philip, “Can any good thing come out of Nazareth?”
Both Philip and Nathanael were Galilean Jews and no doubt the false teaching of the Jewish leaders had influenced them.
The Jewish leaders had declared, “No prophet comes from Galilee!”
In our study of the Book of Jonah we saw that Jonah and some other prophets were from Galilee. So what the Jewish leaders said was false.
Jesus said that Jonah was the only sign that an evil and adulterous generation would be given.
In our text today Jesus anticipates the demand for signs and wonders that would be made of Him [48].
Do you know the geography of Judea and Samaria and Galilee?
Most Bibles have maps.
Find one that shows the Land of Palestine in the time of Jesus’ earthly ministry. There is the land of Judea in the south with the cities of Jerusalem and Bethlehem. Immediately to the north of Judea is Samaria where Sychar or Shechem is located. Then just to the north of Samaria is the land of Galilee with the cities of Nazareth and Cana and Capernaum. Palestine would be like a country and Judea and Samaria and Galilee are like states and then within their borders are the cities that are mentioned.
Jesus had departed from Jerusalem in Judea because of the jealousy of the Jewish leaders. He must go through Samaria to keep a divine appointment with the woman at Jacob’s Well.
Jesus grants mercy to the Samaritan woman.
After staying in Shechem [Sychar: the place of lies] for two more days Jesus departs for Galilee and returns to Cana where He had turned water into wine.
There is an interesting statement in verse 44:
For Jesus Himself testified that a prophet has no honor in his own country.
The difficulty is that if by “His own country” Jesus refers to Galilee where He was raised it seems to conflict with the statement that the Galileans received Him [45].
Surely Jesus knew that some of the people of Galilee had been in Jerusalem and seen Him cleanse the temple. Jesus said that a prophet has no honor in his own country but Galilee is where Jesus grew up in His Joseph’s carpenter shop.
The difficulty is not resolved if by “His own country” Jesus refers to Judea.
Jesus was born in Bethlehem in Judea and it was there that He was registered [Luke 2:4]. It was in Judea where the Jewish leaders opposed him and where He had no honor. But it was also in Judea where His disciples baptized more people than John the Baptist did.
Jesus knew that such honor in Galilee would not bring Him into an immediate collision course with the Jewish leaders.
The difficulty can be satisfied if by “His own country” Jesus refers neither to Galilee nor Judea but to Nazareth.
The sense is, “Jesus departed from Samaria into Galilee but not to His own country Nazareth because He testified, both now and on other occasions, that a prophet has no honor in his own country.”
J. C. Ryle says this view is supported by the fact that in the six other uses of “country” by Jesus He always refers to Nazareth.
Cf. Matthew 13:54, 57; Mark 6:1, 4; Luke 4:23, 24
It helps to better understand a passage when you come to a parenthetical comment to read the text without the parenthesis. Verses 4:4-42, is a parenthetical record in the continuum of events. Read 4:1-3 and then 45ff.
A general account of Jesus’ teaching in Galilee:
Mark 1:14-15
14 Now after John was put in prison, Jesus came to Galilee, preaching the gospel of the kingdom of God,
15 and saying, "The time is fulfilled, and the kingdom of God is at hand. Repent, and believe in the gospel."
Matthew 4:12-17
12 Now when Jesus heard that John had been put in prison, He departed to Galilee.
13 And leaving Nazareth, He came and dwelt in Capernaum, which is by the sea, in the regions of Zebulun and Naphtali,
14 that it might be fulfilled which was spoken by Isaiah the prophet, saying:
15 "The land of Zebulun and the land of Naphtali,
By the way of the sea, beyond the Jordan,
Galilee of the Gentiles:
16 The people who sat in darkness have seen a great light,
And upon those who sat in the region and shadow of death
Light has dawned."
17 From that time Jesus began to preach and to say, "Repent, for the kingdom of heaven is at hand."
Luke 4:14-15
14 Then Jesus returned in the power of the Spirit to Galilee, and news of Him went out through all the surrounding region.
15 And He taught in their synagogues, being glorified by all.
The Healing of the Nobleman’s Son John 4:46-54:
This is the beginning of His great Galilean ministry that spanned about 16 months. Jesus is back in Cana [46] where He performed His first miracle. Cana is the home of Philip, Nathanael and James and John.
A very important person, a nobleman, a royal official has heard that Jesus had come to Cana. This nobleman’s son is at the point of death and the man is desperate. He implores [repeatedly begs] [47] Jesus to heal his son.
Notice that God has no respect of persons in the matter of grace. In the first chapter we see fishermen come to Jesus. In the third chapter there is a self-righteous Pharisee. In the fourth chapter we see a fallen woman. And here is a nobleman from a royal court.
The nobleman’s faith is about to be tested.
What Jesus says in response to the pleading of the nobleman [48] may seem harsh. What did Jesus reply to the Syrophoenician woman who begged Jesus to heal her daughter of demon possession? “It is not good to take the children’s bread and throw it to the little dogs.” [Matthew 15:26]
But what at first seemed to be a harsh rejection turned into healing and a comment by Jesus on her great faith.
Jesus is not rejecting the nobleman’s request but He uses it to teach a lesson about faith. Faith is not the result of “proof”!
The Samaritans believed His words! But here He says:
"Unless you people see signs and wonders, you will by no means believe."
Jesus addresses the man’s frame of mind. There were miracle seekers who had no regard for the higher purpose for which the miracles were performed.
Miracles are never for the sole purpose of benefiting the subject of the miracle. Miracles are to authenticate the message or the messenger.
People who seek signs and wonders are not interested in the message or in who Jesus is but only that they might get some carnal benefit from some “miracle.”
Is anything like that going on today?
If the ignorant people of our day who follow after the Health and Wealth preachers ever learned the purpose of miracles these false teachers would be out of business!
Wealth is not a protection against suffering and disease. The rich are as likely to be afflicted as the poor.
Also notice that the young can die as well as the old.
Young people, go to a graveyard and study the tombstones, and compute the age of some who died. Most will be old but some will be younger than you.
The first person in the world that died was a young man and he died before his father died. If you don’t know who that is shame on you.
None of us know the hour when we will meet Jesus who is the Judge of all men! But judgment is certain!
The answer that Jesus gave the man was not, however, a refusal. But now the man’s faith is about to be severely tested.
At this point the man thought that Jesus would have to come to Capernaum where his son was or else Jesus would not be able to help him.
He also thought that the power of Jesus did not extend beyond death. If his son died before Jesus got to him it would be too late!
The man becomes even more desperate [49].
"Sir, come down before my child dies!"
At that very instant Jesus was healing the body of the man’s son and the soul of the man! Christ’s word is as good as His presence!
50 Jesus said to him, "Go your way; your son lives."
The only way to interpret what Jesus tells the man is:
“Right now your son is healthy!”
The man whose faith had been limited to signs now believes His word!
“Meanwhile, back at the ranch.”
Back in Capernaum [51] the remarkable recovery of the man’s son prompts the servants to immediately go and tell the man. Notice that they say the exact words that Jesus said to the man: “Your son lives!”
When exactly did the child get well?
The “seventh hour” [52] in Roman time would be either 7 am or 7 pm.
The “seventh hour” is the time of perfection.
Trench remarks that the words indicate that there was not a gradual abatement of the fever but that it suddenly left him.
We are not told the time when the servants and the man meet except that it was the next day. We may speculate that the man’s faith allowed him to rest before going home. Some say that the terrain between Cana and Capernaum is so rough that it would have taken all night to travel the estimated 20 miles.
The effect of the son’s healing and the testimony of the man was that his whole household believed in Jesus.
Notice that saving faith is not measured by great numbers of people. Here is one man and then his whole household who believe in Jesus.
More remarkable to me is the great numbers of people who hear the Gospel and continue to reject the free offer of grace. There is nothing in the Gospel message to keep a person from coming to Christ. Jesus said, “You will not to come to Me!” You don’t come because you do not want to come. But I want you to come to Christ. But when you come in faith it will be on His terms. You are not in control of your salvation!
This again is the second miracle that Jesus did when He had come out of Judea into Galilee [54].
The first miracle, turning water into wine, demonstrated His absolute control over the physical universe. Jesus is the Word and John writes that He is the Creator of everything that is not God.
This second miracle demonstrates that physical distance is no hindrance to His divine power and love.
We should see that if Jesus did not have to go to a physical location to heal the man’s son that we do not need to go to some “holy” place to get to Him.
We may extend this notion of physical locations to the idea that the kingdom of God is a physical kingdom on earth. Jesus preached that the kingdom of God was at hand.
The kingdom of God was already established as Jesus revealed Himself to the hearts of men women. The Jews expected Messiah to set up a literal kingdom on earth and free them from the yoke of the Roman Empire.
But King Jesus rules in the hearts of men and women.
Is Jesus your King?
If you say that Jesus is you King does your life show it?
If you were arrested and charged with being a Christian, would there be enough evidence to convict you?
Amen
Sola Scriptura 
