Who is He?
1) The Father
“My Father has been working until now, and I have been working…. whatever He does, the Son also does in like manner. For the Father loves the Son, and shows Him all things that He Himself does; and He will show Him greater works than these, that you may marvel. For as the Father raises the dead and gives life to them, even so the Son gives life to whom He will”
– John 5:17-21
The baby, now a grown man, talks about His father. A loving, powerful Father. He says His father and He have been working together since before time began. Working to give the very first breath of life to the world. Working to breathe new life into the world, for the world has fallen prey to the greatest of all enemies – death.
The Father was God and His Son was Jesus. God loves His son and delights in Him – for Jesus is His son, His equal, and His fellow worker.
2) The Prophets
“You search the Scriptures, for in them you think you have eternal life; and these are they which testify of Me… If you believed Moses, you would believe Me; for he wrote about Me”
– John 5:39,46
Moses was a very special man. So special that God spoke to him face to face, as you would speak to a friend. Moses said that one day, a Prophet like him would come. God would judge anyone who does not listen to this Prophet. Moses was talking about Jesus.
The prophets spoke whatever God told them to speak. And they spoke about a man. A Person who would be born in a small town called Bethlehem. A Man for whom another man would come preparing the way. A Man who would establish a new covenant in His blood. A Man who would bring fresh life-giving water. A Man who would sacrifice Himself for us. A Man who would rise from the dead. They were talking about Jesus.
The Scriptures bore witness of who the Lord Jesus is.
3) The One who prepared the way
“You have sent to John, and he has borne witness to the truth”
– John 5:33
A man appeared in the wilderness, and like a bright and shining lamp piercing the darkness, he drew many to him. Yet he stepped out of the spotlight and cast it on someone else, a Man he hailed as “the Lamb of God who takes away the sin of the world!” This Man, this ‘Lamb of God’, was Jesus. Jesus had come.
4) The Miracles
“The works which the Father has given to Me to finish – The very works that i do – bear witness of Me, that the Father has sent me.”
– John 5:36
Jesus began to do amazing things.
First, at a wedding, when the wine had run out, Jesus turned water into wine! And the wine was better than the original vintage served! This was the first of the signs He, as the Son of God, performed to show us who He is.
Next, by a well in Samaria in the heat of the afternoon, Jesus told a woman whom He had never met before all the things she had ever done. When She mentioned the commming of the Messiah (the one special Person prophesied in the Scriptures to be sent by God), Jesus simply declared, “I who speak to you am he” (John 4:16).
The astounding wedding guests, the astonished outcast, and many others like them tell us – Jesus is the One.
5) The man who was made well
“Do you want to be made well?… See, you have been made well. Sin no more,lest a worse thing come upon you.”
– John 5:36
In Jerusalem there was a man who had been lame for 38 years. Did he want to be made well, Jesus asked? The answer was obvious. The lame man pleaded his helplessness – ‘I want to be well, but I have no one to help me!”
With just a few words, Jesus made the man well. No surgery, no medicine, and in no time at all. But Jesus had more words for the man. He warned him that if he did not renounce sin, a worse thing could befall him.
(And a terrible thing awaits all of us, because of sin – death awaits. It is eternal, agonizing and unrelenting.)
***
Each Christmas, we look upon a little Baby, born to an unassuming couple, sleeping in a little known town. And perhaps we wonder if this Baby is really the One… how can He be the One?
And yet He is! As strange as it may seem,
- This was the Son of God, loved, delighted in and empowered by God since time began;
- This was God’s Chosen One, that He through Moses and the prophets, had been speking about for hundreds of years;
- This was the Lamb of God, proclaimed by John the Baptist;
- This was the Man entrusted with all of God’s power – to heal, to preach, to forgive – to give new life.
And so while we may be unsure about many things, this one thing we can be sure of – that Baby born at Christmas is the very Son of God. Perhaps you could consider 2015 as a year of strengthening your faith – being ever more sure that Jesus is who He says He is.. If so, I would recommend these two steps.
- Dig deep into the Word – hear what God and Jesus have to say; and
- Believe in God – and that He sent Jesus into the world for you.
For the Son of God declares that “he who hears [His] word and believes in Him who sent [Him] has everlasting life, and shall not come into judgement, but has passed from death into life” (John 5:24). Let 2015 be a year where your knowledge is expanded, your faith is strengthened, and everlasting life is yours to enjoy.