Chuck Anderson

For God so loved the world that he gave his only-begotten Son, that whoever believes in him shall not perish but have eternal life. (John 3:16-21) In this passage, John introduces a theme he comes back to again and again in his Gospel and his letters : love . Here is right where it starts: God loved the world . The word there is cosmos , and it means that God loves the whole creation and everyone in it. He demonstrates his love in a very particular way: he gave his only-begotten Son . This is the good news.

Jesus did not entrust himself to them, because he knew what was in them . (John 2:23-25) To put it in context, today's passage comes after Jesus is announced by John and calls his first disciples (John 1), and immediately after the miracle at Cana and the cleansing of the temple (John 2). Jesus is in Jerusalem for the Passover and many people are responding to his ministry. But the passage says that Jesus did not entrust himself to them. The people in Jerusalem were very expectant that a messiah, or anointed one, would rise up and save them. We can see evidence of this sense of expectation in the visit of the wise men (Matt. 2:1-6), and in the account of Jesus' presentation in the temple (Luke 2:22-38). In the book of Acts, a Pharisee named Gamaliel lets us know that there had even been others who claimed to be a messiah (Acts 5:35-39). Given the people's expectations and Jesus' signs, many people started following Jesus. Next, the text says that he saw right throu...

The disciples of John asked Jesus, "Are you the one..., or shall we look for another?" Jesus said, "Go tell John what you have seen: the blind see, the lame walk, lepers are cleansed, and the deaf hear, the dead are raised, the poor have good news preached to them. And blessed is the one who is not offended by me." (Luke 7:18-23) In this passage, we find one of the evidences that the Bible is true. It is not religious propaganda; it gives us the genuine responses of real people to God. We find John the Baptist, a prophet who spoke so boldly about God's word that it got him thrown into prison by Herod Antipas (Mark 6:17-20, Luke 3:19-20). But, sitting in prison, John began to experience some doubts about the identity of the Messiah. Remember, it was John the Baptist who felt unworthy even to carry Jesus' sandals (Matt. 3:11-12, Mark 1:7-8, Luke 3:16, John 1:26-27) because of who Jesus was. John was there and saw the Holy Spirit descend on Jesus and heard t...

Jesus said to them, "The Son of Man is lord of the Sabbath." (Luke 5:5. See verses 1-11 ) Here, we find a story where the Pharisees become murderously angry at Jesus merely for healing a man. Jesus and his disciples were walking through a field on the Sabbath day, and the disciples were picking, shucking, and eating heads of grain. At this point in Luke, the Pharisees have been growing more and more hostile Jesus. In verses 1-2, the Pharisees accuse Jesus of breaking the Sabbath, but in reality they were the ones breaking the law. In his response, Jesus rebukes the Pharisees' for their hypocrisy. Unbiblical traditions obscure the Law      The Pharisees were accusing Jesus based on their own traditions. They had defined "work," so broadly as to include nearly all actions that take even modest effort. The problem with the Pharisees' teaching is that they were denying the ultimate purpose of the Law. The Bible teaches that the ultimate purpose of the law i...