Friday, January 1, 2016

Introduction to John 2:1-11


SPIRITUAL DIARY FOR 1/1/2016 9:26 AM

My Worship Time                                                                    Focus:  Introduction to John 2:1-11

Bible Reading & Meditation                                                         Reference:  John 2:1-11

Message of the verses:  “1 On the third day there was a wedding in Cana of Galilee, and the mother of Jesus was there; 2 and both Jesus and His disciples were invited to the wedding. 3 When the wine ran out, the mother of Jesus said to Him, "They have no wine." 4 And Jesus said to her, "Woman, what does that have to do with us? My hour has not yet come." 5 His mother said to the servants, "Whatever He says to you, do it." 6 Now there were six stone waterpots set there for the Jewish custom of purification, containing twenty or thirty gallons each. 7 Jesus said to them, "Fill the waterpots with water." So they filled them up to the brim. 8 And He said to them, "Draw some out now and take it to the headwaiter." So they took it to him. 9 When the headwaiter tasted the water which had become wine, and did not know where it came from (but the servants who had drawn the water knew), the headwaiter called the bridegroom, 10 and said to him, "Every man serves the good wine first, and when the people have drunk freely, then he serves the poorer wine; but you have kept the good wine until now." 11 This beginning of His signs Jesus did in Cana of Galilee, and manifested His glory, and His disciples believed in Him.”

I want to begin with a very short quote from Warren Wiersbe as he writes about this second chapter of John:  “The six disciples who now trusted Jesus started on their lifelong walk with Him and from the beginning began to learn more about Him.  We who read the Gospel record in its entirety are prone to take these events for granted; but to the disciples, each day and each new event brought marvels that were difficult to understand.  In this chapter alone, John recorded three wonderful revelations of Jesus Christ.”  Now as we think about this statement we as believers in Jesus Christ are also taking a walk with the Lord Jesus Christ each and every day of our lives and as we continue our study in the gospel of John we have the chance to see some of the things that His disciples saw and thus begin to know our Savior and Lord better each day.

What we will see in these first eleven verses of the second chapter of John is the first miracle and as we saw in our SD from yesterday there will be certain miracles that John writes about as we go through the gospel of John and we know why he writes about them as we once again look at our theme verses “30  Therefore many other signs Jesus also performed in the presence of the disciples, which are not written in this book; 31  but these have been written so that you may believe that Jesus is the Christ, the Son of God; and that believing you may have life in His name.”  John then writes the following at the end of his gospel of Jesus Christ:  “25 And there are also many other things which Jesus did, which if they were written in detail, I suppose that even the world itself would not contain the books that would be written (John 21:25).”

If we go back to the fall of man in Genesis chapter three we will find that everything changed with man’s relationship with God and instead of what we learned earlier in the book of Genesis where God said “let us make man in our image,” and that is what He did, we now see man making God in their image, and one of the ways that man does this is to discount the miracles that are found in the Word of God, and especially the miracles that Jesus did, miracles that John tells us show us that He is the very God who created all that has been created, and yet for 33 years was confined in His earthly tent to come and die for our sins.  Man does not want to hear this, but this is the only hope for man.  In talking about how man wants to explain away the miracles of Christ John MacArthur writes:  “But all attempts to explain Jesus as a mere man fail to explain the facts of His life, death (why anyone would have wanted to crucify the innocuous, politically correct sage invented by the rationalist critics defies explanation), and resurrection.  In the Incarnation, God entered the natural realm in a human body.  Therefore it is impossible to remove the miraculous elements from Jesus’ life, as anti-supernaturalist critics have attempted to do.  The historical Jesus of Nazareth and the divine Christ are inseparably linked, for they are one and the same person.  Jesus was and is the God-man.”

These miracles that we read about in not only the gospel of John, but the other three gospels as well constitute one of the most powerful and convincing proofs of His deity.  MacArthur goes on “In keeping with his theme of presenting Jesus as the incarnate God-man, John catalogs eight miraculous signs that He performed.  That list is, of course, by no means exhaustive; there were certainly many occasions when He did more than eight miracles in one day.  Out of the countless miracles that Christ performed (cf. 20:30; 21:25), John selected these eight as examples that prove His deity.  It is not the quantity of miracles that matters, or God would have given that number.  It is the quality of every miracle, as a supernatural act, that proves who Jesus is.  This passage describes the first of those eight miracles, which was also the first miracle Jesus did at the outset of His public ministry (which John records in chapters 2-12).  It may be divided into four points:  the scene, the situation, they supply, and the significance.”  We will begin looking at the scene in our next SD.

Spiritual meaning for my life today:  I am looking forward to following the life of Jesus Christ and to gleam new truths from it so that I will know Him better.

My Steps of Faith for Today:  Study to show thyself approved unto God, a workman that needeth not to be ashamed, rightly dividing the word of truth (2 Timothy 2:15).”

Answer to yesterday’s Bible question:  “The Southern” (Judah).

Today’s Bible question:  “During creation week, on what day did dry land appear?”

Answer in our next SD.

1/1/2016 10:13 AM

 

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