LIFE LESSONS
JOHN
DR. JIM DIXON
REVELATION 1:9-19
OCTOBER 17, 2004
The Apostle John was the younger brother of James. His father was Zebedee. His mother was Salome. It is possible that Salome was the sister of Mary, the mother of Jesus. According to church tradition, John was first a disciple of John the Baptist, if this is true that he is the unknown disciple mentioned in the first chapter of the Gospel of John where we’re told that Andrew and the unknown disciple left John the Baptist and went to follow Jesus.
John was very young when he began to follow Jesus. Many scholars believe he was a teenager at the time. He had come from a family which had a fishing business on the Sea of Galilee, and they were very wealthy. Church tradition teaches that John introduced his brother James to Jesus, and when Jesus looked at James and John, he gave them the title, “Boanerges,” which means, “sons of thunder,” and we’re going to deal with that in a few minutes. James and John and Peter formed a kind of inner circle amongst the disciples. James and John and Peter were those closest to Jesus.
In Matthew 17 when Jesus went up on the Mount of Transfiguration, he took with Him only Peter, James, and John. They saw Him glorified. When Jesus, in Mark, chapter 5, went to raise from the dead the daughter of Jairus, the ruler of the synagogue, he took with Him only Peter, James and John. When Jesus went to Gethsemane the night before the cross, as He went into his agony, He took with him then only Peter, James and John. They were closest to Him. According to church tradition, John was called the “beloved disciple.” John appears to refer to himself this way in the Gospel of John.
While Jesus was on the cross during his crucifixion, He entrusted His mother Mary to the care and the keeping of John. According to church tradition, John and Mary went to the city of Ephesus. Of course, the early church traditions that associate John and Ephesus are very ancient and very strong. Bible scholars do not doubt that John lived in Ephesus. During the reign of Domitian, the Roman Emperor, John was brought to Rome and he was tortured. He survived that. He was then banished to the island of Patmos in the Aegean Sea. It was there that Jesus appeared to him, resurrected and alive for the last time Jesus appeared to him. John wrote his revelation. After Domitian left the Roman throne, during the reign of Nerva, John was allowed to leave Patmos and he returned to Ephesus where he continued to minister throughout Asia Minor. We are told by Eusebius that John died during the reign of Trajan. Trajan ruled Rome from 98 AD to 117 AD. It is believed that John was 98 years old when John died, and he was buried outside the city of Ephesus.
There is much controversy today concerning the books that John wrote. Did he really write them? These five books of the Bible are referred to as the Johannine Literature and they include the Gospel of John, the Letters of 1, 2 and 3 John, and the Book of Revelation. Of course, the Gospel of John is technically anonymous, but in the 21st chapter of the book, it says that the Gospel has been written by the beloved disciple, and according to church tradition John WAS that beloved disciple. The little letter of 1 John is anonymous. The letters of 2 and 3 John claim to be written by one called the Presbyter from the Greek word “presbuteros,” which means, “elder or old one.” According to church tradition, this was the title the Apostle John took in his elderly years. He called himself the Presbyter, the Elder, the Old One.
There are some who believe that John the Apostle had a disciple called John the Elder and he crafted these three letters, but most scholars think that unlikely. Of course, the Book of Revelation tells us that it was written by John from the island of Patmos. There are some who doubt that, but we should be careful to doubt what has such strong external evidence. You see, there is large and extensive external evidence that John did indeed write these five Books of the Bible. In fact, the early church fathers who lived close to the time of John all tell us that John the Apostle wrote these books. So, Tertullian tells us that John wrote these books. Irenaeus tells us that John wrote these books. Eusebius tells us that John wrote these books. St. Jerome tells us John wrote these books. Clement of Alexandria tells us John wrote these books. Origen tells us John wrote these books. Polycarp tells us John wrote these books. Polycrates tells us John wrote these books.
So, the overwhelming testimony of the early church is John the Apostle wrote these books, strong external evidence. This morning as we look at the life of John and we draw our life lessons, I have three teachings and they concern the three themes of John’s writings. These three themes are life, light and love. Again and again, as you go through the Gospel of John, the Epistles of John and the Book of Revelation, you see these three themes: Life, Light and Love. So, we begin with Life. John had a lot to say about the subject of life. John spoke of a very special kind of life.
In the year 1860, a man named Oliver Winchester, the owner and the founder of the Winchester Rifle Company, developed the Henry Repeating Rifle. The Henry Repeating Rifle was the weapon of choice for farmers and for ranchers and for cattlemen. After 1861 with the Civil War, the Henry Repeating Rifle became the weapon of choice for soldiers in that time of strife in our nation.
The Winchester Rifle Company became very profitable. In the year 1873, the Winchester Rifle Company developed the Model 73 Winchester Rifle, and it became the most popular rifle in the world. So, when Oliver Winchester died in the year 1880, he and his family were very wealthy. In that same year, 1880, his son Leonard Winchester took over the Winchester Rifle Company and he continued to build it and expand it for almost four decades until Leonard Winchester died in the year 1918, leaving his widow, Sarah. She was devastated. She was young. She was much younger than Leonard had been, only 42 years old when her husband died. She was shocked when she read the obituary the next day after her husband’s death. The obituary said more people had been killed by weapons produced by the Winchester Rifle Company than by any other weapons in the world.
Sarah Winchester was devastated when she read those words. She sold her home. She moved to San Jose, California. She bought a 17-room mansion. She consulted a physic because she was kind of strange. This physic gave her some strange advice. The physic told her that she would continue to live as long as she continued to build. As long as she continued to grow that mansion and build onto that mansion, she would continue to live. She wanted to live.
Today you can go to San Jose, California, and you can see the Winchester Mansion. You can see the Winchester House. It doesn’t have 17 rooms anymore. It has 150 rooms because she continued to build. It has 47 fireplaces. Tragically, 103 rooms are left without fireplaces. The house has 10,000 windows and 2,000 doors. Some of the doors just open into air. They’re on the second floor. You open the door and there’s just nothing there. Some of the doors open into a wall. Some of the staircases just go right into a wall. She didn’t care what she built. She just continued to build because she wanted to live. Of course, she died at the age of 80 after 38 years of building that house. Her story is sad. Her story is tragic and yet most of us want to live a long life. Most of you want to live a long life and you ‘re not as strange as Sarah Winchester but you want to live a long life.
I read just this last week where apparently Leonardo DiCaprio is coming out with a new movie about the life of Howard Hughes. Of course, Howard Hughes was strange. He died at the age of 71 in a hotel room in Las Vegas. Howard Hughes was afraid of germs. He spent the last twenty years of his life in seclusion because he was afraid of germs. He thought they would cut his life short, so he cloistered himself and surrounded himself only with Mormon attendants because he thought they had fewer germs. Had them wear gloves. He had them wear masks and he tried to keep himself in a germ-free environment. Of course, it didn’t work and he died tragically. It should have occurred to him that eating nothing but ice cream and urinating in bottles and keeping them in your room really weren’t good strategies for longevity.
I know you want to live a long life and you have better strategies. Some of you are trying to eat right. You’re trying to exercise right. You have regular medical checkups. Maybe you take some vitamins. You want to live a long life. But of course, this life is short. It’s so fleeting. I realize that as I get older. I’m approaching 60. I’ll be 59 in two months. I’ll be 59 in the month of December. Life moves by so fast and it’s fleeting. Life in this world is short and it’s hard to maintain it. There are so many dangers. There are carcinogens in your tap water. Even computers, we now discover, with PBDEs are giving off computer dust that’s toxic. You have to laugh because everything seems kind of dangerous.
But of course, we’re talking about biological life, what the Bible calls “bios,” what John the Apostle calls “bios.” That’s biological, earthly life but there’s another kind of life John calls Zoe, the Greek word that refers to divine life. It refers to the life that God experiences. It refers to eternal life. Zoe—life. That’s the kind of life that John wants us to have. That’s the kind of life that John wants you to have, so John talks about Zoe life, and John says of our Lord Jesus Christ, “In Him was life,” and he uses the word Zoe in John, chapter 1.
John says of our Lord Jesus Christ, “He who has the Son has life. He who has not the Son of God has not life.” Again, Zoe—life. Of course, John quotes the words of Jesus, “I am the life.” Zoe—“Ego eimi he Zoe.” I am the life. As we look at John’s statements about life we realize that he quotes the words of Christ too where Christ said, “I have come that you might have life, that you might have it abundantly.” Again, it’s the word Zoe life. So, how about you? Are you content with bias life and you just want to extend it as far as you can? Or do you want Zoe life? Do you want divine life? Do you want everlasting life? Do you want eternal life? That’s the choice and the decision we have to make.
I was reminded just recently of a joke. I think the joke is kind of old but it’s been told again in this election season during the time of the campaigns. The joke concerns a powerful senator who was known for running kind of dirty campaigns. He always made bogus campaign promises. This powerful senator died and found himself at the gates of heaven. There was St. Peter. Peter said to this powerful senator, “We really don’t know what to do with you. We don’t know where to send you. We can’t really decide so we’re going to let you choose between heaven and hell.” The senator said, “Well of course I want to go to heaven!” Peter said, “Don’t be so fast. We want to give you a day to check out hell and a day to check out heaven and then you can make the choice.”
The senator agrees, gets on this elevator and he goes down, down, down. The doors open and he gets this glimpse of hell and he’s stunned because it’s beautiful. It’s like this beautiful country club with beautiful golf courses and he can’t wait to get out on the links. He sees some of his old friends sitting up in the clubhouse and they’re eating lobster and caviar. The devil is there and he’s telling jokes and dancing. The senator spends the day there and he plays some golf and then he sits around with his friends, eats good food, laughs with the devil and dances with the devil. When the day is done, he comes back to the gates of heaven and St. Peter says, “Okay, tomorrow you can check out heaven.”
The next day the senator checked out heaven and he’s impressed. He sees the heavenly city. He sees the streets of gold. He sees beautiful parks. He sees paradise. He sees galactic systems spanning the new heavens and the new earth. He is aware of the fact that he could visit them at the speed of thought. When he finds himself at the end of that day back with the Apostle Peter and Peter says, “Well, what do you want?” The senator says, “Heaven was amazingly impressive and just too much to comprehend, but you know I love golf and I love my buddies and I love good food and I love to dance and I love to laugh so I think I’ll choose hell.” Peter says okay and the senator gets back in the elevator and goes down, down, down. The doors open and he’s stunned as he looks out on nothing but a parched barren landscape and people who are dying of heat and of thirst. He goes up to the devil and he says, “Hey! What’s happening? This isn’t what I saw yesterday.” The devil says, “Well, yesterday I was campaigning and today you voted!”
In this election season I think we can all relate to that kind of stuff but we hope that you can understand that you really aren’t going to get a chance after you die to choose between heaven and hell. You’re not going to have that chance. The Lord is not going to give you a chance to check out hell and check out heaven and then make a choice. We make our choices now. That’s what the Bible tells us. We make our choices now. Today is the day we choose. What choices have you made? “He who has the Son,” John says, “has life.” Zoe life—everlasting life.” “He who has not the Son has not life.”
So, have you made that choice? Have you come to the foot of the cross? Have you asked Jesus to forgive you of your sin, to wash you whiter than snow? Have you invited Jesus to come and sit on the throne of your life, to be your Lord? Have you asked Him to give you eternal life? What choices have you made? It’s all about life, Zoe life.
John also speaks a great deal on the theme of light. In fact, John says more about light than any other writer in the Bible, so we have this second message and this second theme from John, and it concerns light. Of course, John says there was a man sent from God whose name was John. He’s referring at that point to John the Baptist. There was a man sent from God whose name was John. He was not the light, but he came to bear witness to the light. John tells us the true light which enlightens every man is coming into the world. Of course, John tells us as well that the light shines in the darkness and the darkness does not overcome it. In John, chapter 3, John says, “This is the judgement that light has come into the world and mankind loved darkness rather than the light.” John says, “This is the message we’ve heard from the beginning. God is light. In Him is no darkness at all. If we say we have fellowship with Him while we walk in darkness, we lie and do not live according to the truth, but if we walk in the light as He is in the light, we have fellowship with one another, and the blood of Jesus His Son cleanses us from all sin.” So, John talks about the light and he does it throughout the Johannine Literature.
What does light mean? What does John mean when he says, “God is light?” What does John mean when he tells us to walk in the light? We can understand when we go back and look at the priesthood. Of course, the priesthood was the very center of the religious system of Israel. Amongst the priesthood the greatest individual was the High Priest and the High Priesthood is shrouded in mystery. The High Priest had two responsibilities. The High Priest was to represent the needs of people to God, and of course the High Priest was to represent the will of God to the people.
On Yom Kippur, the Day of Atonement, you know the High Priest went into the Holy of Holies where no one else could go. He sprinkled the blood of animals on the Mercy Seat of the Ark of the Covenant, seeking to atone for the sin of the people. He vested the sin of the people upon the scapegoat and sent the scapegoat into the wilderness unto Azazel, symbolically removing the sins of the people from them. He represented the needs of the people before God but of course he also had to represent the Word of God and the will of God to the people. For this he had the Urim and the Thummim. To this day, Bible scholars do not know exactly what the Urim and the Thummim were but they were mystical supernatural objects. They were kept over the heart of the High Priest and beneath the breastplate. Through the Urim and the Thummim, the High Priest was able to discern the will of God for the people.
The word Urim means, “light,” and the word Thummim means, “truth.” Light and truth. We should understand that to the Hebrew and to the Greek, there was no difference. Light is truth. Truth is light. Of course, it’s light that enables us to see the truth, so when we hear John the Apostle speaking again and again of light, we should understand he’s speaking of truth.
How do you decide what’s truth? What’s your primary source of truth? Do you get the truth from the newspapers? Do you find truth reading books? Do you look to the television to provide your truth? Do you look to teachers and professors in institutions of higher learning? Is that where you find your truth? Or do you arrive at truth on the basis of your own rational faculties, through the magnitude of your own logic, your own deductive reasoning? Do you arrive at truth through sensory observation? Do you believe it if you can see it? Do you believe it if you can touch it? Do you believe it if you can hear it? If you can smell it? How do you arrive at truth?
This whole area of study in philosophy and theology is called epistemology. It has to do with how we arrive at the truth. I know you have many epistemologies in your life, many methods of arriving at truth. Of course, during the Enlightenment, the so-called Age of Reason, philosophers came up with their epistemology which was based on faculties of reason and logic, and they developed what today we call the scientific method. The scientific method is an epistemology. It’s a means of arriving at truth. We all use it and it serves some purposes but it’s very limited.
For instance, just recently a man name Steven Pinker, a Professor at Harvard University, has written a couple of books. One is called “How the Mind Works.” The other book is called “A Blank Slate.” In these books, Dr. Steven Pinker argues there is no human soul. He bases this on the scientific method. That’s his epistemology. There is no soul. He says in ancient days people viewed mankind as having a spiritual side called “the soul” and a physical side called “the body.” The soul was the user. The soul was the user of the body. Even the brain was used by the soul. He said that now, because of neuroscience and new imaging techniques, we understand there is no soul. That’s what Pinker says. There is no soul. What we call the soul is just the information gathering activity of the brain. There’s no soul apart from the brain. Imaging technology shows that thoughts and even emotions trigger neuro activity in the brain. Therefore, Pinker concludes, there is no soul. When the body dies, the brain dies. When the brain dies, the soul dies. There’s no life after death. There’s no heaven or hell. There’s no eternal judgement. There’s no accountability. Eat, drink and be merry for tomorrow you die! I promise you, his message is going to go forth in classrooms and institutions of higher learning all across this country and it’s just darkness.
I serve on the Board of Trustees at Colorado Christian University. I thank God for Christian colleges and universities that seek to share the light against a tidal wave of darkness. Of course, Steven Pinker’s definition of the soul is one inch deep. I would imagine that his definition of the soul is an embarrassment even for other professors at Harvard, those in the Philosophy and Religion Departments. But we live in a world where there are all kinds of epistemologies. We get in trouble when people take epistemologies that are meant to deal simply with the temporal and try to use them to weigh things that are eternal.
So, where do you find ultimate truth? John says we find light in Jesus Christ, the true light which enlightens every man who’s coming into the world. Jesus said, “I am the Light of the World.” Jesus said, “Ego eimi he aletheia”—I am the truth. So, we find truth through this epistemology, the Word of God. Jesus is the Word of God living. The Bible is the Word of God written. The Gospel is the Word of God proclaimed. That’s where we find ultimate truth. Light.
Of course, before Jesus left this world He said to those who believe in Him, “You are the light of the world.” Do you take that seriously? Jesus said, “You are the light of the world.” He sends you forth as light into the darkness. You’re supposed to tell people about Him. You’re supposed to tell the world about Jesus. It’s not politically correct to tell anyone about Jesus because they’ve got their own beliefs and you’re not supposed to violate that. But you’ve been sent forth.
I can look back on my family history. My mother’s side of the family was English. My dad’s side of the family was English and Scottish. I’m sure if you went back far enough you would find some of my distant relatives who were Druidic which means they were animists and their religion was animism. Thank God that around the year 400 AD Christianity came to my people. Maybe by background you’re Nordic. Maybe your descendants, long ago, used to worship Odin. Maybe they were really into Norse mythology. Thank God around the year 1000 AD Christianity came to your people. Maybe you’re Asian. Maybe you’re African-American. Maybe you’re Hispanic/Latino. It doesn’t matter. Thank God for the Gospel. Thank God for the light. Thank God for the cross. Thank God for the empty grave. Thank God for eternal life. Jesus Christ is light and we’ve been sent forth into the world to be truth-bearers.
Thirdly and finally, John speaks of love. Life, light and love. I know our time is short. John says more about love than any other biblical writer. Of course, John was a disciple of Jesus Christ and Jesus Christ was a Rabbi. Whether Jesus went through the rabbinical schools, we don’t know. We do know that the largest rabbinical school in Galilee was at Sepphoris and Sepphoris was only a couple of miles from Nazareth where Jesus grew up, just a small hike across the valley to Sepphoris. Undoubtedly Jesus and his father Joseph went over to Sepphoris to do stone masonry and carpentry because there were great building projects going on in Sepphoris at that time.
Many Bible scholars believe that Jesus had gone through the rabbinical schools there at Sepphoris, partly because some of His phraseology and His statements are found in that rabbinical school in their literature. But also, because Jesus was referred to with the title Rabbi and He was given all five rabbinical titles in the Bible. Even His enemies called Him Rabbi. Even other rabbis called Him Rabbi and this surely would not have been true had He not gone through the rabbinical schools.
Now, you understand rabbis had authority. We’ve seen this before. Rabbis had authority. They called it “semikhah.” It’s a strong word and it means, “authority.” Rabbis had semikhah. They had authority. They had authority to recruit disciples and Jesus went forth and recruited His disciples including John. They had authority to interpret Torah, the divine revelation, divine instruction, Holy Scripture. Rabbis had authority to interpret it. They had the authority to bind their disciples to their yoke. Jesus bound His disciples to His yoke. He said, “Take My yoke upon you and learn of Me.” Your yoke, in rabbinical thought, was your interpretation of Torah. Many different rabbis had different interpretations of Torah.
Some rabbis said, “Torah is all about knowledge and you have become my disciples that you might grow in knowledge. It’s all about knowledge.” Other rabbis said, “No, it’s all about blessing. You have become my disciples that you might learn about Torah and live according to Torah and thereby be blessed. It’s all about blessing.” But Jesus said, “No. It’s all about love. That’s My yoke.” That’s the yoke He placed on His disciples. He said, “Torah is all about love. The Bible is all about love. Divine instruction is all about love.” He wanted His disciples to grow in love. He quoted the Schema from Deuteronomy 6, “You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart.” He quoted a lesser-known passage from Leviticus 18, “You shall love your neighbor as yourself.” Jesus said, “All of Torah is summed up in this, that you love. You love God, you love your neighbor. It’s all about love.”
John the Apostle understood this. As he walked with Jesus, He understood this, so it’s John that gives us the new commandment on Maundy Thursday. It’s John who records those words of Jesus when Jesus said, “A new commandment I give unto you that you love one another.” It’s John who gives us the greatest description of God in all of the Bible when John says, “God IS love.” “He who loves is born of God and knows God. He who does not love does not know God for God is love.” John said, “We love because He first loved us.” John said, “This is love. Not that we love God but that He loved us and gave His Son to be the expiation for our sins.” John said, “Brothers and sisters, if anyone has the world’s good and closes his heart against him, sees his brother in need and closes his heart against him, how does God’s love abide in him?” It’s all about love. No one said more about love than John. Not even Paul who wrote The Love chapter.
This is amazing because John, when you really look at the guy he was before he met Jesus, just wasn’t very loving. We’re told that Jesus called James and John “Boanerges,” Sons of Thunder. Bible scholars aren’t exactly sure what that means but they think it has to do with temper. They think it has to do with ill temper. Jesus called James and John “Sons of Thunder.” They were men of temper and sometimes ill temper.
So, you read in the Bible how Jesus is moving from Galilee to Jerusalem, passing through Samaria. He goes with the disciples into a town and He presents His message to the people and they reject it. What does John say? John says to Jesus, “Lord, let’s call down fire from heaven and just toast the village.” That’s what John says. “Lord, let’s call down fire from heaven and kill them. Let’s kill all of the people.” Jesus has to rebuke him. That’s the kind of man John was in his early life.
Of course, you see James and John coming to Jesus asking that they might be the second and third most powerful people in the kingdom of heaven, getting the other disciples kind of angry which we can understand. They were immature. They had so much growing to do. And they grew. Their lives were transformed by Jesus. John was transformed by Jesus. John was transformed. He refers to himself as “the beloved disciple.”
Some people think, “Well, why would he describe himself as the disciple who Jesus loved,” and I think it was because he was just so amazed that Jesus loved him and he saw the transforming power of that love. Of course, St. Jerome tells us that in John’s later years he would walk around the city of Ephesus, and he would walk down the streets and he would simply say, “My little children, love one another.” He had been transformed by Jesus. So, how about you? How about me? Have we been transformed? Do we know it’s all about love? That’s what the scriptures are supremely about—love.
I read recently about the Xerox Company. Of course, the Xerox Company makes copiers. The strange thing is that Xerox, the name of a company, has also become, in the English language, a verb. So, people say, “Would you xerox this and would you xerox that.” That’s really unusual for a company name to become a verb in the English language. You don’t see people saying, “Hey, would you Frigidaire the ice cream?” “Would you Toro the lawn?” “Hoover the carpet?” You don’t see that. I guess if Xerox began to produce really crummy products, probably the word xerox would no longer be a verb in the English language.
So, how about the word Christian? What does the word Christian mean to most people? What do they think of when they think of Christians? Are you aware of the fact that in years past, decades past, centuries past, the word Christian was such a noble word that even non-Christians tried to behave in a “Christian” way and they spoke of people being “not very Christian” or people being “very Christian” in their behavior. You don’t see the word Christian really used like that much today. I think it’s partly because maybe we’re not as loving as we need to be. We’re not out there on the front lines where all the pain is. We need to be trying to help people who are hurting, physically, emotionally, relationally, anyway. We need to be.
So, we have these life lessons from John about life, light and love. Jesus is the source of Zoe life, the kind of life that is eternal, the kind of life that really matters. If you’re going to have that life, you’ve got to make the choice now. Of course, Jesus is the Light. He’s the Light of the World. He’s the very source of truth. He must be your highest epistemology, your means of obtaining ultimate truth. Of course, God is love and He has called us as people of Christ to demonstrate that love to the world. Let’s close with a word of prayer.