PERSONS TESTED BY THE ABSENCE OF CHRIST
John 5: 8-16; 6: 16-21; 9: 10-12; 20: 11-16; 21: 1
The gospel writer, John, follows very closely the movements and teaching of Jesus. It is a great subject of John’s gospel that he keeps the narrative very closely related to the Lord Himself. Other gospels mention other persons, but John keeps in the main to the movements and statements of the Lord Himself. But I have read of five instances where the narrative relates to certain persons, that is, the Lord leaves certain persons, and what comes out in these persons is what appreciation they have of the Lord Himself. And so with each one of us, we are all left to ourselves. The Lord is good to us. He has spoken to us these two days, but eventually He will leave us to work out whether we have an appreciation of Him or not. We are therefore left to prove ourselves. I do not intend to go into much detail or speak at length, but to touch on these five incidents.
The first is this man who was laid thirty-eight years with his infirmity, and the Lord offers to make him well, and does make him well. Jesus said to him, “Arise, take up thy couch and walk”, and immediately the man became well, and took up his couch and walked. He was a subject of relief, he was helped as to his infirmity, he derived some benefit from the Lord’s speaking here. Now he was tested because he took up his couch and walked and the Lord had left him. In a sense the Lord leaves us to prove ourselves; and He left this man, but he is a sample of one who was pleased with just getting benefit. Many in the gospels received benefit from the Lord. Take the five thousand who were fed; they ate and were satisfied and we hear no more about them, there was no moral work effected with them. It seems so with this man, there was no moral result. What the Lord looks for, and what the glad tidings have in view, is that there should be a moral result. It seems this man had more affinity with the Jews than he had with the Lord. It says, “The Jews therefore said to the healed man, It is sabbath, it is not permitted thee to take up thy couch”. Instead of being attached to the Lord personally he found his fellowship among the Jews. Therefore, you see, he was tested and found wanting. It may be he was only physically helped, and many in the gospels received physical help. In Luke’s gospel there were ten lepers cleansed but only one returned. The Lord says, “the nine, where are they?”, Luke 17: 17. They derived benefit from the Lord. Were they attached to Him? Had they appreciation of Him? Therefore we are challenged and tested as this man was here, and it would seem there was certainly not a deep work with him, he was content with having relief. I am just taking these incidents as they happen.
In chapter 6 the Lord went up into the mountain and the disciples went down to the sea and having gone on board ship went over the sea to Capernaum. John does not record that the Lord commanded them. Another gospel says that the Lord commanded them to go into the ship, but in any case the disciples were found, you might say, in the right place, in the ship. It says, “they went over the sea to Capernaum”. They were in the ship all with one objective, the same objective, rowing in the same direction and were making progress. Rowing involves the whole being, the arms, the feet, and so on; they were rowing in rhythm, and they rowed about twenty-five or thirty stadia, that is about three miles, or about five kilometres. So they are making progress and it seems the Lord was pleased with that. These are persons who are left to themselves and pull together in the same direction, rowing in rhythm, a very commendable company in this ship. We make no progress if we have different objectives, and obviously if we row in different directions. But here they are all agreeing together, each one committed, and the Lord came to them. There is no doubt He was pleased with them. While He was absent, here they were making progress towards one objective. I think we would all like to reach the same objective and we would all desire to row together for the Lord’s pleasure, that the Lord may join us, may come to us. They were first of all frightened when the Lord came. I suppose if the Lord came corporeally amongst us we would all be frightened, but the Lord comes to us nevertheless in a spiritual way to encourage us. It says, “They were willing therefore to receive him into the ship; and immediately the ship was at the land to which they went”. I just call attention to this beautiful feature of these disciples acting together. It is one of the objectives the Lord would have us reach, and ministry is meant to help us. Ministry and food they have in this chapter. They are meant to promote this feature of unity. There is nothing the enemy is more opposed to than brethren dwelling together in unity, or rowing together in unity. The enemy cannot do much about a believer who preaches the gospel and testifies individually, faithfully. He may discourage, but he can work havoc when it comes to what is collective. What he is most opposed to is a company expressing Christ, and if our object is Christ we will express Christ.
In John 9 we have this very attractive man who was born blind, and the works of God appear in him. It is not so much here in this chapter a question of our sins and the forgiveness of our sins—of course that is important in its own place—it is a matter of expressing the works of God. This man has a very simple but very definite impression of the Lord Jesus. You might say that he does not know very much. The neighbours said to him, “Where is he?” He says, “I do not know”. Certain things he does not know, but there is one thing he knows, that whereas he was blind, now he sees. There was something definite in his soul, it was “A man called Jesus”. How simple that is, “A man called Jesus made mud and anointed mine eyes, and said to me, Go to Siloam and wash”. He was sent and he obeyed and he came seeing. And then all these verses following the Lord is absent, and this man is tested; first of all with the neighbours in verse 8, then the Pharisees from verse 13, then the Jews from verse 18, and his parents in verse 20. He stands firm and resolute in his appreciation of the Lord Jesus, in appreciation of “A man called Jesus”. I trust “A man called Jesus” means something to every one here. It is amazing how the simplicity of appreciation of “A man called Jesus” enabled this man to stand against all the opposition. In fact he becomes an embarrassment to them. The Lord Himself was an embarrassment in chapter 8. They took up stones to stone Him. The Lord was rejected in chapter 8, and this man was rejected in chapter 9. They could not do anything with him. He really baffled them by the simplicity of his appreciation of Jesus. All they could do was to cast him out. He did not belong to their system, they could not fit him into their system. They could not fit the Lord in in chapter 8, they could not fit in this man in chapter 9. Let us be established, be true to our appreciation of “A man called Jesus”. You know ‘Jesus’ is not a title. The Lord has titles, but ‘Jesus’ is His name, His personal name. We are often tested as to our fidelity to Jesus. And this man was faithful against all the opposition, and the works of God were manifested in testimony.
So in chapter 20 we have the Lord risen, but He does not appear immediately. The Lord is somewhere around, and Peter and John and Mary are tested. They are quite active, they ran and one ran faster than the other, and John arrived at something in intelligence. It says at the end of verse 8, “he saw and believed”, but he went to his own home. Both Peter and John “went away again to their own home”, quite content with the intelligence they had. Then it says, “But Mary stood at the tomb weeping without”. We have with Mary not only appreciation but deep affection. No one could satisfy her but Jesus. He was absolutely indispensable to her. She remained at the tomb. The tomb was the last place that Mary knew the Lord to be, and in the devotion of her affection she remained by the tomb. I often think you could have offered Mary the best business proposition that ever was offered, she would not be interested; her interest was the Lord Jesus, nothing else in this world. We often speak about her. I wonder how many of us are like Mary? I am afraid not very many, maybe none of us. I think when John wrote this he would say, Why did I go home? Why did not I stay with Mary? Why did not I tell Mary I had come to something in intelligence? The disciples went away again to their own home. You think they might have said to Mary, You know, Mary, we have come to something. It all emphasises the devotion of the affection of Mary. Well, what can we say? Would we not all desire to have the devotion of Mary? The Lord had a great message to give, and Mary was the only one available to get the message. He could have given it to John or Peter, but they went away. Mary remained the only one available for this wonderful message, “go to my brethren and say to them, I ascend to my Father and your Father, and to my God and your God”. This is the excellence of a believer’s devotion of affection. You see it is a question of the Lord Jesus personally. All my failures, and there have been many, have been a failure in discipleship to Jesus. We can be as near to the Lord Jesus as we desire to be. May the Lord encourage us.
In chapter 21 John might have written, After these things the disciples went astray. He might have said, After these things there was a tremendous departure, there was a very sad failure; but he does not say that. He writes, “After these things Jesus manifested himself again to the disciples”. They went off on an expedition independently. Most of us know what that means. Yet the Lord is absent. He leaves them to express themselves, and meets it all in grace. Has He not done that with us? There is not a word of rebuke. He fed them. He said, “Come and dine”, John 21: 12. He has something to take up with Peter but He takes it up very tenderly. It is the third manifestation, it says so in John 21: 14, “This is already the third time that Jesus had been manifested to His disciples”. So that John does not describe how wrong it was, exactly, although it was wrong of course. It became the occasion for the manifestation of the Lord Himself. Well it ends with the word, “Follow me”, in fact the last word to Peter is, “Follow thou me”. John was following. The Lord could call attention to John as one who was following. The Lord would no doubt say to every one of us here, “Follow thou me”. It comes down to each one individually, young or old, “Follow thou me”. It could not be more intimate, nor more appealing, “Follow thou me”. May the Lord help us.
COLOGNE
2nd May 1992
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