Dale Partridge - An Introduction to the Gospel of John

00:00:00.000 you might have remembered the game as a child many of us learned it's called one of these things is

00:00:10.400 not like the other one of these things is not like the other i know the moms have probably played

00:00:14.680 this with their children you put you know four objects in a line you know maybe four cards in

00:00:21.600 front of a child and one of them is different and you tell them to identify the thing that's

00:00:25.380 different, right? It might be three cats and one dog, right? It might be three circles and one

00:00:30.220 square, three blue objects and one yellow object. And it's a simple way to teach children to

00:00:36.740 recognize contrast, to notice that which is different. Now, in some ways, that is exactly

00:00:43.120 what happens when you open up the four gospels. Okay, Matthew, Mark, and Luke, they stand beside

00:00:50.640 one another with similarity. But then you get to John, and John is different. One of these

00:00:57.600 is not like the others. And Matthew and Mark and Luke are traditionally called the synoptic

00:01:05.780 gospels. Now, the word synoptic basically means seen together. And what that means is that you

00:01:13.500 can lay out these three gospels, Matthew, Mark, and Luke, and see an enormous amount of common

00:01:19.360 ground between them. They have a testimony of Jesus's earthly ministry from different

00:01:25.620 perspectives, but generally follow the same timeline. Now, then comes John, right? So Matthew

00:01:34.380 begins with Abraham, right? And he gives this genealogical reality of showing Jesus being

00:01:44.160 connected to Adam. Mark begins with John the Baptist. Luke begins with the birth of John

00:01:53.480 the Baptist and the birth of Jesus. But John opens up his gospel and goes back further

00:02:02.440 than all of them. He doesn't begin with Bethlehem. He doesn't begin with Israel. He doesn't

00:02:10.940 begin even with Adam, he goes back before the world began. And he says, in the beginning was

00:02:20.340 the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. See, John is trying to mirror something

00:02:30.880 of Genesis in this Gospel of John. He's trying to demonstrate that the man in which he is about

00:02:38.560 to talk about is truly the Ancient of Days. And before John tells us what Jesus did, he's trying

00:02:47.660 to help us understand who Jesus is. So it's less about what Jesus accomplished and what he did,

00:02:56.940 and it's more about who the man Christ Jesus truly is. Now John is different

00:03:04.520 from the synoptics, not because he presents a different Christ,

00:03:09.660 but because he gives us a different angle of the same Christ. And what I mean by that is that

00:03:16.120 Matthew and Mark and Luke, they give us much more of this testimony about the pragmatics,

00:03:21.000 about the timeline, about the chronology, about the earthly ministry of Jesus's life.

00:03:27.120 But John shows us the biography, the spiritual biography of who Jesus is.

00:03:34.320 And there's no parables in John.

00:03:37.280 You don't get the parables in John.

00:03:39.640 There's no birth of Christ.

00:03:41.280 There's no baptism of Christ in John.

00:03:43.460 There's no exorcisms recorded in John.

00:03:47.800 John does not narrate the institution of the Lord's Supper.

00:03:50.440 instead no john gives us the things that the other gospel writers did not offer he gives us

00:04:00.840 the wedding at canaan he gives us the nicodemus story to jesus by night the woman at the well

00:04:10.460 the uh the story of bethesda he gives us the man that's born blind he gives us the story of lazarus

00:04:17.480 and his resurrection from the dead. Jesus is washing the disciples' feet, the long upper room

00:04:24.500 discourse. He gives us John 17, which is the high priestly prayer. He brings us into the more

00:04:29.760 intimate details of the matters of the life of Christ. In fact, John contains some of the most

00:04:37.720 recognizable scriptures and passages that we have in human history. For God so loved the world,

00:04:43.860 right john 3 16 i am the resurrection and the life i am the way and the truth and the life

00:04:48.340 and no man comes to the father except through me in john chapter 14 i'm the vine and you are

00:04:53.440 the branches john chapter 15 before abraham was i am these magnificent statements

00:05:02.340 and these sayings are part of what makes john unlike anything else that we have in the new

00:05:11.160 testament and so the early church recognized this uniqueness of the gospel of john clement of

00:05:18.240 alexandria said that john wrote uh the last gospel and that's actually why we have it uh

00:05:25.080 chronologically as the last gospel it was the last gospel to be written according to church history

00:05:30.160 but he said clement of alexandria under the it said under under the inspiration of the spirit

00:05:35.640 John composed a quote spiritual gospel a spiritual gospel it's less focused on the physical nature of

00:05:44.300 his ministry but truly the spiritual biography of who Jesus is. Augustine compared the four evangelists

00:05:52.180 to the four living creatures in heaven and associated John with the eagle because John

00:05:58.200 soars above the earthly ministry of Christ and fixes his gaze upon his eternal divinity end quote.

00:06:04.240 the reformers did the same thing Calvin famously said that while the first three evangelists

00:06:11.560 exhibit as it were the body of Christ John exhibits the soul of Christ Martin Luther

00:06:18.040 called John's gospel the one fine true and chief gospel and I think I think that really gives us

00:06:28.400 a place to look at the purpose of this book why is it chief what was its purpose why did john

00:06:38.180 write this gospel and i think there's something beautiful here because not every passage and not

00:06:44.480 every book gives you the purpose clause for why a book was written but john does john does

00:06:52.960 near the end of the gospel in john chapter 20 verses 30 to 31 john writes now jesus did many

00:07:03.120 other signs in the presence of the disciples which are not written in this book but these

00:07:09.780 are written so that you might believe that jesus is the christ the son of god and that by believing

00:07:17.480 you may have life in his name. That's why John wrote this gospel. So if you're ever wondering

00:07:25.320 what's the purpose, why did John set out to write this gospel, he tells you. And you see it in the

00:07:35.100 words, so that. But these are written so that you may believe. Point number one, you may believe.

00:07:43.380 believe what the Jesus is the Christ who's the Christ the son of God

00:07:50.100 and what for and that by believing you may have life in his name

00:07:56.520 see John is an evangelistic gospel it's why so many people say hey to new believers

00:08:03.580 if you want to read something in the Bible read the gospel of John the purpose of John

00:08:08.120 is very evangelistic. He's aiming to convince you, to persuade you, to inform you about who Jesus

00:08:13.860 actually is. And he has selected specific events and specific miracles and conversations and sermons

00:08:21.540 and portions of his identity for a particular purpose that might persuade people. And in fact,

00:08:27.820 because it is written not just by the hand of John, but by the Spirit himself, I trust that

00:08:32.540 these particular events that John chose are the most effective at persuading and being used by

00:08:39.080 God to bring people to Christ. It is a very effective gospel. In other words, John is not

00:08:49.580 attempting to tell us everything that Jesus did, right? These are the finest of Christ's wine.

00:08:56.760 He's bringing the best out in this particular book.

00:09:01.460 Everything that Jesus did is not written in John's gospel,

00:09:05.520 but the most important parts of who Jesus is, is communicated in this gospel.

00:09:12.740 John is selective.

00:09:14.580 Now the question that is hanging over all of this text,

00:09:18.840 like what is John trying to communicate deeply?

00:09:23.140 He's answering the question, who is this man?

00:09:28.100 Who is this man?

00:09:30.340 Who is Jesus?

00:09:32.580 And John answers immediately.

00:09:34.840 Even in the first few verses of chapter 1, he starts just rolling out massive claims of identity.

00:09:43.740 Claims that you go, if this is true, everything is changing in my life.

00:09:48.400 he is the word who was with god and was god he is the one through whom all things were made

00:09:57.000 he is the true light coming into the world he is the only begotten son who reveals the father

00:10:03.300 he is the lamb of god that takes away the sin of the world he's the messiah the king of israel

00:10:09.980 the son of man the savior of the world these are massive statements if these things are true

00:10:15.580 It should change everything you do.

00:10:20.260 And throughout the gospel, Jesus confirms this identity more than any other gospel because he has these eight I am statements.

00:10:32.700 And we're going to get a chance by God's grace to go through them.

00:10:35.580 But he says, I am the bread of life and I am the light of the world and I am the door for the sheep.

00:10:42.980 I am the good shepherd.

00:10:43.900 I am the resurrection and the life.

00:10:45.440 I am the way, the truth, the life.

00:10:47.500 I am the true vine.

00:10:49.060 But then, again, I think the most massive claim, and the claim that almost got him killed,

00:10:55.180 was this claim in John 8, 58, before Abraham was, I am.

00:11:01.900 It's this revelation that I am, that Jesus is saying that I am not of the same world and framework as you.

00:11:13.140 i am above you i am before time i am the ancient of days and john i think pushes people i think

00:11:23.940 when you read john you essentially land in the same place as c.s lewis he pushes you to this place 0.55

00:11:30.300 where you have to make an observation and c.s lewis says jesus is either a liar a lunatic or lord

00:11:41.080 those are the only options that you have these claims about who jesus is and the claims that 0.94

00:11:47.580 jesus makes about himself he is either a liar a lunatic or he's lord see john pushes evidence 0.81

00:11:55.740 and claims upon us that force us to categorize christ under one of those labels is he a liar 0.93

00:12:03.700 is he a lunatic or is he lord and it's why toward the end of the gospel john records the confession

00:12:13.040 of the apostle thomas this is very important you can see that john is moving the per the reader

00:12:20.520 through the identity of jesus and as you get toward the end of the gospel after the resurrection

00:12:26.300 he records thomas's words that he's he's seen the resurrected christ and he's putting his hand in

00:12:35.000 his side you may have seen the old painting where he's looking down in jesus's side and he's putting

00:12:40.560 his hand inside of his wounds here and he says my lord and my god my lord and my god

00:12:48.640 and that confession is where john wants to take us he wants to get you to the place that you say

00:12:57.720 my lord and my god

00:13:00.620 and the structure of the gospel helps us see how he gets there and so i'm going to just give you

00:13:08.380 this broad structure because again for the next year or so maybe longer we're going to be in the

00:13:13.820 book of john but i want you to understand that the grand structure here the book the book is

00:13:20.380 divided into about four parts first comes this magnificent prologue and it's john 1 1 through

00:13:29.700 verse 18 and it's where john introduces the great themes of the entire book okay so you got the word

00:13:37.580 creation, life, light, darkness, witness, spiritual birth, grace, truth, incarnation, all of this here

00:13:45.480 in these first 18 verses. And then roughly from verse 19 all the way through chapter 12, we have

00:13:53.660 what is called the book of signs or the section of the signs. And John is selecting these extraordinary

00:13:59.840 works of Christ that he has selectively chosen here, turning water into wine, raising Lazarus

00:14:06.480 from the dead, and each sign is revealing something about his character. In fact, every time I have

00:14:11.900 taught or studied the book of John, you look at what is being said, and you realize that every

00:14:16.840 single word, every single action has some other deeper motive or meaning or symbolic understanding

00:14:23.560 or connects back to the Old Testament. Everything is so dense and so deep, and it takes great

00:14:29.560 exposition to pull these things out now then you have chapters 13 through 20 which turn toward what

00:14:38.720 people call the book of glory the book of glory and this is this is where jesus's public ministry

00:14:45.500 it begins to narrow so he's he's having lots of interaction with many people and now he's pushing

00:14:50.800 in towards the disciples and the focus is the kind of the more intimate relationship he has

00:14:56.560 there. He washes their feet. He gathers them together. He teaches them about his departure.

00:15:01.720 He promises them the Holy Spirit would come. He prays his great high priestly prayer for them

00:15:07.400 and also for the church. And then he comes to the crucifixion, and then you get the resurrection.

00:15:13.000 Then you get Thomas's confession. Then you get the saving of, or the redemption of Peter,

00:15:19.020 right? And this is again moving into chapter 21, which is really an epilogue, okay? So you have

00:15:23.540 the prologue in the first, in the last chapter 21, you have this epilogue. It's kind of wrap-up

00:15:27.860 statement, and you have the resurrected Christ, and he restores Peter. He points the apostles

00:15:34.120 to this great work. I actually posted in Signal this week. Jesus says to Peter after he's restored,

00:15:41.060 he says, when you were a child, you would want to go places and could not go there, and when you,

00:15:48.100 there will be a time in the future where it'll be like that. You'll want to go somewhere, and they

00:15:52.640 will take you to somewhere that you do not want to go and they will dress you in clothes that

00:15:56.840 you do not want to wear and they will stretch your arms across something and he says follow me

00:16:04.040 and then you see the painting of Peter and he's upside down on the cross and his arms are being

00:16:10.800 stretched across this cross and he's being crucified in Rome and you realize that Jesus

00:16:18.700 is telling Peter about his own death. And he says, in spite of that, follow me. It's an incredible,

00:16:27.720 incredible way to close this book of John. Now, what about John himself? John is the son of Zebedee.

00:16:38.880 He's the brother of James. You might have remembered some of the stories about these two.

00:16:43.120 he's a fisherman by trade before Jesus calls him to ministry. He's about 10 to 15 years younger

00:16:49.100 than Jesus. That's what most people believe. He's the youngest apostle. It's also why he lives

00:16:54.720 likely the longest. I mean, obviously not just because of that, but Jesus said he was going to

00:16:58.360 live the longest, but he died approximately around the year 100 AD. And so when you hear about people

00:17:05.640 in the early church at, you know, 120 or 140 or 150 AD, this is only 50 years after the apostle

00:17:12.440 John has passed away. Now, we often view John as this kind of soft, spirited apostle, right? He's

00:17:21.240 kind of known as the apostle of love, right? You can read the book of John. You could read his

00:17:26.000 epistles, and they're just gentle. They're actually very easy to read in the Greek. They're

00:17:30.960 very fundamental, basic Greek. If you go to seminary, the first thing you're going to do

00:17:36.120 is not translate Paul's writings from Greek to English, okay? You're going to work on the first 0.99

00:17:43.000 epistle of John. It's very fundamental, very basic, easy to read Greek, and this is, again, he's trying

00:17:49.540 to be accessible to his audience so that the average person who reads or speaks Koine Greek

00:17:55.500 can understand this beautiful mission of Jesus Christ. Now, you might remember that Jesus gives

00:18:04.400 the label to James and John the sons of thunder okay so you have you have this great apostle of

00:18:12.420 love who we all know but you got to remember that before this Jesus calls James and John

00:18:17.520 the sons of thunder now that name emerged because after they were exiting out of a Samaritan village

00:18:24.440 that refused to hear and listen to Jesus James and John asked whether they could

00:18:30.580 call down fire and destroy them, right? So he's got this massive passion. And of course, right,

00:18:37.760 he's young, right? He's probably 15, 17, his brother's maybe 18. Can we just call down fire

00:18:43.100 on these idiots? And Jesus gives them this label, the sons of thunder. And it's not a positive, 1.00

00:18:49.220 it's not a positive label. It captures who they are at this particular point.

00:18:55.280 but this is the same man who would later write beloved let us love one another or God is love

00:19:03.980 or we love because he first loved us okay this is the same man now again I don't think that John

00:19:11.560 loses his courage or or loses a little bit of the righteous side of that thunder and I say that

00:19:17.220 because if you read the other parts of his epistles he has some very intense words he says

00:19:22.500 whoever says i know him but does not keep his commandments is a liar and the truth is not in

00:19:28.340 him that's a pretty bold statement he says whoever makes a practice of sinning is of the devil he

00:19:35.000 says everyone who hates his brother is a murderer right so he still has that bite in his writings

00:19:41.520 it's it's i think covered by so much love that we sometimes forget about that passion

00:19:47.400 but concerning false teachers John said do not receive them into your house or even greet them

00:19:54.000 lest you participate in their wicked works again just it sounds like oh that's the scripture it's

00:19:59.800 like imagine someone that's teaching a false gospel and you're like get out of my house

00:20:03.940 I don't even want you here like that's the kind of passion that still exists in some of John's

00:20:09.480 writings but what I want to point out is I think that his his thunder was essentially sanctified

00:20:15.840 right is that you have this beautiful balance of truth and love it's truth and love and the truth

00:20:22.960 can always seem sharp but it's also it's it's it's kind of shaved down the sharpness the edge

00:20:31.080 of the blade is dulled a bit with this love now we also know that among the 12 john belonged to

00:20:39.080 kind of this closer inner circle of James, Peter, and John. James, Peter, and John had this access

00:20:46.280 to Jesus that was rare among the other apostles. And because of that, they had some vantage points

00:20:55.700 and perspectives that the other apostles didn't. It's actually why I believe that John's gospel is

00:20:59.820 so unique. He had this access to Jesus and this love that Jesus had for him that brought a

00:21:08.420 relationship that was able to produce this biography of truly not just his Lord, but I would

00:21:14.740 argue that it was John's best friend. And so there's this very great closeness here. And the

00:21:21.640 early church places John in Ephesus when he wrote this gospel. Later towards the end of his life,

00:21:27.960 there's Ephesus. There's also Patmos is off the coast of Ephesus where people believed that he

00:21:33.800 would write Revelation. But Irenaeus, writing in the second century, says that John, the disciple

00:21:41.200 who leaned upon Jesus's chest, published his gospel while residing at Ephesus. Clement, who

00:21:48.320 lived less than 75 years after John, claims that John's gospel was to be written last, as I said

00:21:55.820 earlier. Chronologically, it's written last. J.C. Ryle. Now, I love J.C. Ryle. I've loved the guy for

00:22:02.480 a long time. He was an Anglican priest, an Anglican bishop later in his life in England

00:22:08.540 in the late 1800s. And he said of John's Gospels that it is preeminently full of things hard to

00:22:16.900 be understood. Okay, it is a magnificent book, hard to be understood. And he says that it contains

00:22:23.200 particularly large portions of deep things of God. Deep things of God. And you're going to see this.

00:22:29.720 We're going to touch on these things.

00:22:32.120 His J.C. Ryle's Exposition of the Gospels, he writes a whole collection of books on the expository thoughts on the Gospels.

00:22:40.040 And there is a book for Matthew, there is a book for Mark, and there is a book for Luke.

00:22:45.540 There is three books for John.

00:22:48.160 Okay, in fact, when you stack them up to each other, the commentary on John is about as thick as all the commentary on the rest of the Gospels.

00:22:57.040 And so it is a very deep and rich exposition of this gospel.

00:23:03.940 And when I say this deep things of God, I really, really, we are going to touch bases on many of the deep things.

00:23:11.160 We encounter the Trinity, the incarnation, regeneration, election, total depravity, unconditional election, union with Christ,

00:23:19.020 the perseverance of the saints, the offices of Jesus that he holds, the person in the ministry of the Holy Spirit.

00:23:27.040 we're going to hit all of these dimensions over the next year or so now if i could have one book

00:23:34.020 people have asked me if you could have one book of the bible dale which book would it be now i've

00:23:38.280 taught as you many of you guys know i've taught all the way through the book of romans i did

00:23:43.320 over two years in the book of romans and man it is what i would say uh systematically the magnum

00:23:49.020 opus of the gospel uh exposition right of the new testament it is beautiful doctrine but if i could

00:23:56.980 only choose one book, it would be John. It would be John. I love Romans. I love Genesis, and I love

00:24:05.640 John, but if I could only choose one of them, I would choose the book of John. Now, this is why

00:24:13.160 many Christians, many Reformed people love the gospel of John because it talks so much about

00:24:24.240 salvation. There's so much around soteriology that you can have. People often say that it is a very

00:24:31.380 reformed gospel. Now, I've sometimes said that it's difficult to read Romans and become a Roman

00:24:38.240 Catholic. And I will also say that it's difficult to read John and not start thinking like John

00:24:44.220 Calvin. Okay, it is very similar. You start going down this road and you start seeing, ooh, John

00:24:51.120 calvin was certainly formed heavily by the doctrines and truth of the gospel of john in fact

00:24:59.100 we see uh what we'll find in john is exactly what we find in the 39 articles uh you have you know

00:25:06.760 man's inability sovereign election effectual grace christ's uh perseverance of his people

00:25:12.800 we're going to see some of these great truths that are in the confessions make themselves clear

00:25:19.920 in John's gospel. And so as we begin this gospel, as we work toward this gospel, I want us to

00:25:28.720 approach it with a certain level of sobriety, a certain level of sobriety. I want our minds

00:25:33.780 prepared for this. We're not merely opening up some sort of ancient biography of an interesting

00:25:40.060 religious figure, okay? We're not just reading some detached observations of some historian

00:25:46.220 talking about this man, Jesus.

00:25:50.460 We are receiving the testimony of an apostle.

00:25:56.600 But not just the apostle John,

00:26:00.600 the closest apostle to Christ.

00:26:04.540 We are reading the words

00:26:07.560 of someone who walked with Christ,

00:26:11.380 of someone who ate with Christ,

00:26:13.000 someone who heard Christ teach,

00:26:15.300 who watched Christ heal the sick.

00:26:18.880 Someone who saw Lazarus walk out of the tomb.

00:26:23.020 We're reading the gospel of the apostle

00:26:25.700 that was the only one there of the apostles

00:26:29.240 sitting at the foot of the cross.

00:26:31.600 We're watching the words of that gospel.

00:26:35.480 We're learning from that apostle.

00:26:37.840 and we can think about this great purpose of this book remember this great sentence and

00:26:52.980 about i have written these things down for you that you will believe that jesus is the christ

00:26:58.060 the son of god and that by believing you may have christ or you may have life in his name

00:27:02.660 this is again this is the purpose now but for some of you that already know christ

00:27:07.460 I already know Christ. I already have Christ.

00:27:13.280 John also isn't just talking about us having eternal life, but having the perspective of Christ in this life.

00:27:23.380 And I think that's what you were going to get in this gospel of John.

00:27:28.620 Is the gospel shaping your life?

00:27:35.360 Like, are you submitting to Christ?

00:27:37.460 Are you going deeper with Christ?

00:27:42.580 Or have you kind of stayed the same?

00:27:46.660 Are you bearing more fruit as you age?

00:27:52.980 Are you telling more people about Christ as you grow older?

00:28:00.400 Okay, we often say that we want to know Christ more.

00:28:02.960 And so we read theology books and we might pray more.

00:28:07.020 We might go to church more.

00:28:07.880 And again, those are all good and beautiful things.

00:28:10.260 But there is no greater way to know Christ than to go to the source in which reveals Christ,

00:28:15.740 which is the scriptures, and which, from my position, this gospel,

00:28:20.860 this gospel gives us the greatest biography of Christ.

00:28:24.180 If you want to know Christ and you want to order your life after what and who Christ is,

00:28:30.420 this is the book.

00:28:31.620 so as we begin

00:28:34.100 john's gospel this year i want us to come with open bibles i want us to come with an open mind

00:28:44.460 attentive minds believing hearts kind of a degree of holy seriousness

00:28:49.700 because let me tell you why this may be the only time you ever hear the gospel of john preached

00:28:58.940 through. I don't know how long you're going to live, but this might be the only time that you

00:29:06.560 get to hear the gospel of John be preached verse by verse. And there are things, there are truths

00:29:14.560 in this gospel that will help you live, that'll help you when you face trials, that'll give you

00:29:22.500 peace and it'll give you joy and ultimately that will prepare you for death there are great and

00:29:30.580 glorious things here for us and this is a great moment and so prepare your minds read before we

00:29:38.720 get here if we're going through chapter one read it once a week so that you can saturate your mind

00:29:45.300 in this gospel and that pray pray that this gospel might do something to our own church that it might

00:29:51.520 bring us back and ground us into the fundamentals of the faith of the gospel of Jesus Christ. Amen?

00:29:58.880 Let's pray. Father, we thank you, Lord, for this gospel of John. Lord, we ask that you would bless

00:30:04.940 us, that you might give us so much gold from it. Lord, that it would come out

00:30:11.960 and be fruitful for us and truth for us. Lord, that it would be something that quenches the

00:30:19.700 deeper parts of our souls, Lord, that it would remove anxiety, that it would give us faith and

00:30:24.680 strength and wisdom and understanding, Lord. We pray that it would give anybody who's not even

00:30:29.200 at our church now, Lord, that it would bless them. Lord, we ask for your favor in this.

00:30:34.900 In the name of Christ, we pray. Amen.

Dale Partridge - August 30, 2026

An Introduction to the Gospel of John

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