The Lord in this book writes
to set forth a doctrinal fact. He has a doctrinal purpose and
that is to set before us Jesus of Nazareth as being the very
Son of God, the Word who is made flesh. And then John writes also,
not only with a doctrinal purpose, but with an evangelistic purpose. He writes that, as he says in
the last verse of John chapter 20, that we might believe, and
that believing we might have life through His name. That's what we want. We want
to do those two things. And I have a doctrinal purpose
this evening. I also have an evangelical purpose
this evening, or an evangelistic purpose this evening, I want
to set before you the Lord Jesus as He is in the Scriptures. He's God of very God. No question
about that. We know the Jews understood when
He said back in John chapter 5, My Father worketh hitherto
And I were, the Jews knew, that which he was saying was this.
I'm equal with the Father. I'm the Son of God. And that's
why they were ready to murder him. They were ready to put him
out of business. Because they said, you are just
a man. And yet you would make yourself
to be God. To be God. But our Lord Jesus,
He never hesitated to say that He was God. He was equal with
God in every way. Back in John chapter 10 in verse
30, he said, I and my father are one. And then they took up
stones once again with the intention of murdering him. This is the
great doctrine of the gospel of John, that our Redeemer, the
one who entered into this world by way of a virgin's womb, born
of a virgin, lived A life above any kind of reproach, above sinfulness. This man is God. This man is
God. This is our belief, and this
is the doctrinal position of the Word of God. Jesus of Nazareth
is the Lord. He's the Lord. Isn't that brought
forth in Acts the second chapter in Peter's great message on the
day of Pentecost when he said, God has made this same Jesus,
the man Christ Jesus. God's made this same Jesus, this
one you crucified. He said God's made him Lord and
Christ. He's God. He's God over all,
blessed forever. He's God our Savior. That's the
doctrinal fact that John is setting forth for us in the Gospel of
John. He has a doctrinal purpose. If
you don't believe that Jesus of Nazareth is God in the flesh,
We need not go any further with you. We need not speak to you
anymore about the things of God, because he that denies the fact
that the Lord Jesus is God in the flesh, he doesn't know God.
We have no common ground. There is no belief, there is
no salvation where there is a denial of the deity of the Lord Jesus.
So John sets out, he has this before him as he writes this
book, led of the Spirit of God, he has a doctrinal purpose. Jesus
of Nazareth is the Son of God. And of course, that which comes
out of that is everything that Jesus of Nazareth did. And that
which gives value to all that He did is His deity. His deity. Other men lived a good life,
as we would call good. Nobody else lived a life above
sin like our Lord Jesus did, but other men lived a somewhat
good life, and other men died what we might call a martyr's
death. But their death benefited nobody. Their death didn't save anybody.
But this man, this man, there was, there's something about
his death that made the salvation of all of those for whom he died
to be absolutely certain. In fact, he saved his people
by his death. And the way he could do that
is that he's God. He's God. There rested on the
shoulders of Jesus of Nazareth this great responsibility of
removing the indebtedness of all of God's people. And this
man, this God-man, was up to the task. because he's God. He's God. And so John writes
with this doctrinal purpose, Jesus of Nazareth is the Son
of God. But he also has an evangelistic
goal, and that is that people would believe. You know, as we
meet together today, tonight, and as we meet together every
Lord's Day, it isn't just to give out information, though
we do that. We do give out doctrinal information. We set forth the identity of
Jesus of Nazareth. We set forth who God is, in His
perfections, in His attributes. We set forth ourselves and our
sinfulness. We set forth the Lord Jesus,
God and man. We tell people what He did and
the reason that He did it in order to save His people from
their sins. And then we say, believe on the
Lord Jesus Christ. We have an evangelistic goal.
I want you to believe. I want you to believe. I want
you to believe on Christ Jesus. I want you to lay hold of Him. You remember in Romans chapter
10, Paul wrote and said, Brethren, my heart's desire and prayer
to God for Israel is that they might be saved. I want them to
be saved. That's what he said. Yes, we
give out information. We give out doctrine. And we
do so without any kind of apology. We hold to the Scriptures. We
set forth the Word of God as it is, identifying God in us
and Christ Jesus. And then we say, believe on the
Lord Jesus Christ. Paul wrote in 2 Corinthians chapter
5, he said, knowing therefore the judgment of God that's coming,
we urge you, we compel you, to be reconciled to God. And John
says in John chapter 20, these things have I written unto you,
that you might believe that Jesus is the Son of God, and that believing
you might have life through His name. That's what I want. I want
you to have life. Life, spiritual life. Who gives spiritual life? Only
God can give spiritual life. And He gives it as the Word of
God goes forth. The Word of God is what God uses
to quicken dead sinners. This is the incorruptible seed
of the living Word of God, that it lives and abides forever.
And this is the Word of God, the gospel which we proclaim
to you. And so we have, John has a doctrinal
purpose and an evangelistic purpose, and we do too. We do too. Now, as we think about John's
twofold purpose of writing this book, of course, led by the Spirit
of God, inspired by the Spirit of God, he does so, he sets,
he does so in a twofold way. First of all, he sets forth the
words of the Lord Jesus Christ, and then he sets forth the works
of the Lord Jesus Christ. That is, he relates to us the
teachings of our blessed Savior, and then he sets before us the
miracles of our Lord Jesus Christ. John set forth who he is. And he set forth the words of
Christ Jesus. Go through the book. Just take
some time and read through the Gospel of John. And read the
words of our Lord Jesus. What He has to say about Himself. Do you remember back in John
8? He says, I'm from above. You're from beneath. Where did
you say you come from? Above! Above. Back in John chapter
6, you remember he's talking to the people after he took five
barley loaves and two little fishes and fed 5,000 men and
then women and children in addition to the 5,000 men. And the next
day, our Lord Jesus, He speaks about Himself being the bread
of life. He said, I am the bread come down from heaven. That's His own words. His own
words. He identified Himself. He identified
where He came from. And He identified why He entered
into this world. He said back in chapter 3, He
said, as Moses lifted up the serpent in the wilderness, even
so must the Son of Man be lifted up. And He loved to identify
Himself as the Son of Man. I must be lifted up. Lifted up
in what way? Lifted up to die. Lifted up to
be crucified. So, our Lord's words, John sets
forth His words, and then John sets forth His works. His works. His mighty miracles attested
to His identity as being the Son of God. Even one of their
religious leaders. Nicodemus, he spoke to the Savior,
came to the Savior by night there in John chapter 3, and he said,
Rabbi, oh great teacher, he didn't call him the son of God, he didn't
say you're the Lord, he said, Rabbi, we know that thou art
the teacher come from God, for No man can do the miracles that
you do, except God be with him. But this is what Nicodemus didn't
know. Not only was God with him, but
he was God. He was God. Nicodemus missed
that, but later the Spirit of God is going to instruct him
on that. He didn't know that he was speaking
to God manifest in the flesh. And that's the way John begins
the book by identifying the Son of God. He said, in the beginning
was the Word and the Word was with God and the Word was God. The same was in the beginning
with God. He said all things were made by Him and without
Him was not anything made that was made. And then His works. His words
and His works. And as we get to John chapter
11, this is one of the greatest works that He did. At least up
to this time, up to this point, it's the greatest miracle that
our Savior performed. This is a monumental miracle. This is like the biggest, biggest
sign of all. The biggest sign of all. Go over
to John chapter 20. John chapter 20. We talk about
another great sign. That's our subject this evening.
Look at John chapter 20. This raising of Lazarus, this
is like the biggest, most climactic of all the signs that our Lord
gave of His deity, of His divinity, of His Godhead. Look at John
20 verse 30. And many other signs did Jesus
in the presence of His disciples. They're not written in this book.
He did other signs as well. They're not written in this book.
Our Lord performed an abundance of signs right before the eyes
of the people. Miracle after miracle. And many
of them, they were actually participants of the miracle. Such as in John
chapter 6. And you know what they demanded?
We want more signs. That's what they said. Go back
to John chapter 6. Here's the passage where our
Lord Jesus is set forth as the bread of life. Look at John chapter
6. Our Lord multiplied the bread
and the fish and fed thousands upon thousands of people. Now
the next day, because the crowd has followed Him, and really
what they want is another free meal. That's what they want,
another free meal. They followed Him and now our
Lord has got something to say to them in verse 30. Or this
is what they say unto him, verse 30, John 6, 30. Then said, they
said therefore unto him, what sign showest thou then that we
may see and believe thee? What do you work? We want to
see a sign. Now, the day before this, They
ate abundantly. All they could eat. This is like
a buffet. Fish and bread. Fish and bread. And you know it had to be the
best fish and the best bread that they'd ever had because
it came forth from the Savior's own hands. These are the hands
that would be nailed to a cross for His people. And these blessed
hands of our Lord Jesus, those hands that blessed His disciples
as He ascended up to heaven, those hands took those five little
barley loaves of that young lad and those two fishes, and He
multiplied it, and the people were looking and watching as
He did that, and then basket after basket after basket was
filled, and then the disciples distributed till everybody had
eaten to their full, and then they had a dozen baskets left
over! My, what a sign! What a sign! What an evidence of His deity! And the next day they say, what
sign showest thou then that we may see and believe thee? And they had witnessed this.
You see, that which the natural man needs is not to observe a
miracle. That which the natural man needs
is to be the object of the miraculous grace of God within. That's what
the sinner needs. We need God to do something for
us. Now I know God, He elected us
in old eternity and He redeemed us by the blood of the Lord Jesus
and that which necessarily comes forth from that is the work of
the Holy Spirit and that's what we need now. We need now, it
doesn't finish off the work of the Lord Jesus. He finished the
work of redemption. Let's be clear about that. You
understand that, don't you? Our Lord Jesus reconciled us
unto God. He redeemed us to God by His
blood. There's a blessed, blessed atonement
made for all of our sinfulness. And the same God who ordained
our salvation and ordained the death of the Lord Jesus Christ
also ordained the way by which we come to grips with that and
we come to understand all that God has already done for us in
Christ Jesus. That's through the work of the
Holy Spirit. We need to be the object of the
miraculous grace of God. But these people, We want to
see a sign. Go back to Matthew chapter 16. Matthew chapter 16. Here's another
reference. Here's the Pharisees and the
Sadducees and they were always after our Lord Jesus. They were
always hounding him about something like a pack of mad wolves. And
here they are again, Matthew 16 verse 1. The Pharisees also
with the Sadducees that came, attempting Him, desired Him that
He would show them a sign, watch it, from heaven. We want to see a sign from heaven. Keep that, file that in your
memory banks. And go with me back to Isaiah
chapter 7. We want to see a sign from heaven. Now let me show you this passage
back here in Isaiah chapter 7. You see, our Lord Jesus, He did
many signs and wonders before the eyes of the people. But there
was an even greater sign that they absolutely missed. I'll show it to you. Isaiah chapter
7. Here we're told some things that
happened during the reign of King Ahaz of the southern kingdom
of Judah. Ahaz was a vile king. Ahaz was a godless king of the
southern kingdom, of the kingdom of Judah. Probably the most ungodly
king to ever sit upon the throne of David in the kingdom of Judah. He was an idolater. He brought
idolatry into Jerusalem and into Judah. He even offered up one
of his boys as a sacrifice to one of the gods that he worshipped.
He was burned to death. That's what Ahaz did. But he
still pretended to worship Jehovah also. Well, in God's purpose, the kings
of Syria and Samaria joined together. They formed a confederacy. They
were in league with one another to overthrow Judah. and King
Ahaz. And as a result, King Ahaz was
absolutely terrified. He sees death in his future. He sees that the kingdom of Judah
is going to fall and that he's going to fall, he's going to
die. But instead of turning to the
God of Abraham and Isaac and Jacob, Instead of looking to
the God of David, upon whose throne he sat, he turned to the
king of Assyria for help. He turned to the Assyrians and
their armies for assistance. He didn't trust the Lord. He
trusted the arm of the flesh. He looked to the armies of Assyria. And so God sent Isaiah. to King Ahaz, and the prophet
of God warned him. The prophet of God said, don't
you put your trust in the armies of Assyria. If you do that, your kingdom
is going to fall, and you're going to fall. He said, here's
what you do, King Ahaz. Trust the Lord. Rest in the Lord. The battle is the Lord's. But
look at Isaiah 7 and verse 9. And we get a little information
here, the head of Ephraim is Samaria, the head of Samaria
is Remeliah's son, who was Pekah, in case you want to know, P-E-K-A-H,
Pekah. But here's what the Lord through
Isaiah said to King Ahaz, if ye will not believe, If ye will
not believe, surely ye shall not be established. In other
words, if you want to flip it around, if you believe, you believe
God. Believe God's Word. Just look
to the Lord. We're in trouble. Lord, here
are your chosen people, and here are these massive armies, and
they've gathered together. Here are the Syrians and the
Samaritans. And they're in this confederacy
against us. Oh God, spare us. Oh God, we
sinned against You and we deserve to be destroyed. We deserve to
be wiped off the face of the earth. But Lord, show us mercy.
If they had done that, they'd have been established. But Isaiah
tells them this, if you don't believe God, if you don't believe
God's Word, if you don't rest in the Lord for your health,
For your preservation, you will not be established. In other
words, you're not going to remain. You're not going to remain. Those are very powerful words. You ought to underline that sentence,
by the way. What a vital statement. If you
believe me, here's what the Lord is saying. If you believe me,
all is well. But if you don't believe me,
you're not going to remain. That'll be the end of you. That
would be the end of you. Very powerful statement. You
see, the ruin, the ruin of this mighty King Ahaz, who was an
ungodly man, the ruin of King Ahaz and the eventual captivity
of Judah was due to their unbelief. They wouldn't believe God. Now
look at verses 10 and 11. Moreover the Lord spake again
unto Ahaz, saying, Ask thee a sign of the Lord thy God. Ask it either
in the depth or in the height above, that is, from heaven. Remember Matthew 16.1? You want
to see a sign from heaven. That's what they said. Lord show,
or Jesus show us a sign from heaven. And now the Lord says
through Isaiah to King Ahaz, ask a sign of the Lord thy God. Ask it in the depth. Ask me to
do something in the depth. Or ask me to do something that's
from above, from heaven. But in verse number 12, Ahaz He pretended reverence for God. Now, I'm sure that he remembered
the Scripture over in Deuteronomy 6, Thou shalt not tempt the Lord
thy God. In other words, don't ask Him
for a sign. You know, people do that all the time. Ask God
for a sign. Lord, if you're really there,
I want to feel a strong breeze in my face. Tempting the Lord
thy God. The Lord said, don't do that.
Don't do that. But on this occasion, God said,
ask me for a sign. Ask me for a sign. I'll show
it to you. And King Ahaz, he said, I'm not
going to ask. I'm not going to tempt the Lord. Acting pious. But he was a heathen,
ungodly man. Verse 13, and he said, that is,
Isaiah said, Hear ye now, O house of David, is it a little or small
thing for you to weary men? You offend men? You do that?
That's a small thing. They offended Isaiah. They offended
the rest of the preachers of God by their unbelief. But He said, will you weary My
God also? Will you offend God also by your
unbelief? But God didn't say, I'm not going
to give you a sign. He gave them a sign anyway. Therefore
the Lord himself shall give you a sign. Oh, it'll be hundreds
of years in the future. But here's the sign. And you
know where the sign came from? It came from heaven. Behold,
here's the sign. What's that, Gal? Here's your
sign. Here's your sign right here. Behold, a virgin shall
conceive and bear a son, and thou shalt call his name Immanuel. God with us. There's your sign. There's your sign. Hundreds of
years go by. Of course, Judah is taken into
captivity. the kingdom of Israel, eventually
they just destroy it. They swallow it up because of
their ungodliness, their wickedness, and their idolatry. Many of the
Jews were released from captivity. They sort of rebuilt the temple. And they went back to worship
in the purpose of God because Judah, a scepter, the scepter
could not depart from Judah until Shiloh came. Right? We know that
from the words of Jacob. So Israel lost its existence. Israel, the northern kingdom,
those northern ten tribes, they lost their identity. Not the
Southern Kingdom. Because the Lord Jesus, He's
coming out of the tribe of Judah. Of Judah. So Judah had to remain. And then, hundreds of years in
the future, God gave a sign. And the sign He gave was somebody. You see, our Lord Jesus, He not
only provided signs, He was the sign! That's what we need to
see. He was the sign Himself! He was the greatest sign of all! Look with me in Luke, the second
chapter. Luke, the second chapter. Here's the evidence of the veracity
of God, that is the faithfulness of God, and the truthfulness
of God. You see, how can we be sure that
when God says something, that it's absolutely certain? Well,
because God said, I'm going to give you a sign from heaven.
And the Lord Jesus came. You remember this story here
in Luke chapter 2. Verse 8, they were in the same
country, shepherds abiding in the field, keeping watch over
their flock by night. And lo, the angel of the Lord
came upon them, and the glory of the Lord shone round about
them. They were sore afraid. And the
angel said to them, fear not, for behold, I bring you good
tidings of great joy. but shall be to all people. For
unto you is born this day in the city of David a Savior, which
is Christ the Lord, and this shall be a sign." God's going
to give you a sign. Unto you. You go into Bethlehem
and you're going to find a babe wrapped in swaddling clothes,
lying in a manger. Man, that don't happen very often.
Most of them are lying in nice comfortable bed or wherever,
but not the Lord Jesus. And here's what the angel said,
this will be the sign. This is a sign for you. This
is the evidence of the veracity of God, the faithfulness of God,
the truthfulness of God. You'll find a babe, wrapped in
swaddling clothes, lying in a manger. You see, our Lord Jesus Himself,
He is the sign. He is the sign. Now go back to
John 11 real quick. So these miracles which our Lord
did, they were signs that He was the Son of God, that He was
God come down from heaven, and He Himself is the sign from heaven
that God keeps His Word. You see, He is He is the seed
of the woman. God said in Genesis 3, I'm going
to send the seed of the woman. Many, many years go by. Was God unfaithful to His Word? No. Just have to wait. Just have
to wait. And then in due time, the seed
of the woman was born. He was born. He said through
Moses, I'll raise up a prophet greater than Moses. Just wait. He will. He will always do what
he says he's going to do. He said that through Abraham's
seed, not seeds as many, but seed as one, singular, that all
the people of the world, all the nations of the world would
be blessed. And from every nation, kindred, tribe, and tongue, God
has a people chosen unto salvation, and they're blessed through the
seed of Abraham, who's Christ Jesus. Christ Jesus. Here in John 11, this is a very
familiar story to you, and I'm just going to introduce it to
you, and then we'll go home here in a couple of minutes. But up
to this time, it's the greatest miracle our Lord had performed. Now, He had raised at least two
other people. He had raised the ruler's little
girl who had died. She had just died and our Lord
went in and took her by the hand and raised her up. You remember
the widow's son? He had died and they were carrying
him on his beer or kind of a bed over to the grave, to the grave
site. And our Lord met the funeral
procession. That's life meeting death. And
when life meets death, death's got to go. Had our Lord raised
him from the dead, and then here's Lazarus, but now he's been dead
four days. Four days, and you remember the
Jews, they didn't embalm. The Egyptians embalmed. They did that. They had a process
by which the body was preserved, but not the Jews. Not the Jews. Therefore, they had to be buried
the same day. Lazarus had been buried while
our Lord was gone. Our Lord, as we shall see, deliberately
delayed arriving into Bethany. And He did it for the glory of
God. So that these disciples and others as well would say
He's God because He raised the dead. You think about these three
people that our Lord raised. Here's a little girl. She still
probably had her rosy cheeks and she still A little warmth
to her. She's dead. Here's a little boy. He manifests a little more signs
of death. He's being carried to the tomb. And then here's Ladrus. He's
been dead four days. Corruption has set in. Even Martha
will say, when the Lord Jesus has rolled the stone away, Martha's
going to say, you don't want to do that. He's been dead four
days, but now he stinks. But you know what? You know what
they all had in common? Equally dead. They're dead. If
you're dead, you're dead. There are no stages of death.
And it's like the natural man. It's like you and me when the
Lord comes to regenerate us. Like the little girl, we look
good outwardly. We kind of have a tenderness
about us, a kindness about us. Some people have very pleasant
personality, but they're dead, spiritually dead. Others, like
the little boy, the widow's boy, manifest some more evidences
of death and, you know, make some blunders in life. And then
others are just absolutely rotten like Lazarus. But this is what
all of mankind has in common. We're all spiritually dead. And
again, there are no stages of death. And we all need the grace
of God, the life-giving grace of the Lord to bring us back
to life. That's why the Savior said you
must be born again, doesn't matter who you are. You may be outerly
a very fine person, or you may say, well, you know, I've made
a few mistakes, or you may be the vilest wretch that ever lived,
but all are dead in trespasses and in sins. And we need the
grace of God. So our Lord is going to raise
Lazarus from the dead. I'll give you
this, between chapter 10 and 11, you know, three months go
by. Our Lord doesn't go back to Bethany,
which is just a couple of miles from Jerusalem, where He will
die, because now in chapter 11, we're getting into the last days
of His life. Our Lord spent some time where
John the Baptist had been baptizing, And the last verse of chapter
number 10 says, and many believed on him there. You know who sowed
the seed? John the Baptist. John the Baptist. And who gives
the harvest? The Lord of glory. Some sow,
some water, the Lord gives the increase. And here there's an
increase. Many believed on him there. Many
believed on him there. Up to this time, this is the
greatest miracle that our Lord performed, but he has two more
miracles that he's going to perform. One of them is in a garden at
night when he's arrested and there's a servant of the high
priest. Malchus was there and Simon Peter
pulls his sword out and I suppose he really wanted to cut his head
off or maybe split his skull, but he just cut his right ear
off and our Lord bends down and picked that ear up, put it right
back down, put it right back on that servant and healed him.
But the greatest miracle is yet to come, his own resurrection. Because he said back here in
John chapter 10, Verse 18, no man taketh it from me. My life
He's talking about. But I lay it down on myself.
John 10, 18. I have power to lay it down.
I have power to take it again. I have power to take it again. Who is Jesus of Nazareth? He's God in the flesh. And though
He died, you just wait. You just wait. He's going to
raise His own body. He's divine. He's divine. Oh, what a miracle. What a sign. What a sign. The greatest sign
is yet to come, His resurrection. And you go through the book of
Acts. You know, that's what they're preaching in the book of Acts,
the resurrected Christ. Exactly. They're preaching His
exaltation. His exaltation included His resurrection,
His ascension, and He went back to heaven. Psalm 24, His coronation. And then finally, there will
be the judgment when every knee shall bow, every tongue shall
confess that Jesus Christ is Lord to the glory of God the
Father. Well, let's sing