Dr. Sproul starts this section with a discussion about what constitutes a credible witness. Jesus points first to John the Baptist as His first witness. He cites His miracles as His second witness and His Father as the third. Jesus next uses the Scriptures as His fourth witness.

We will continue now with our study of the gospel according to Saint John. This morning we are reading John 5:31–47:

If I bear witness of Myself, My witness is not true. There is another who bears witness of Me, and I know that the witness which He witnesses of Me is true. You have sent to John, and he has borne witness to the truth. Yet I do not receive testimony from man, but I say these things that you may be saved. He was the burning and shining lamp, and you were willing for a time to rejoice in his light. But I have a greater witness than John’s; for the works which the Father has given Me to finish—the very works that I do—bear witness of Me, that the Father has sent Me. And the Father Himself, who sent Me, has testified of Me. You have neither heard His voice at any time, nor seen His form. But you do not have His word abiding in you, because whom He sent, Him you do not believe. You search the Scriptures, for in them you think you have eternal life; and these are they which testify of Me. But you are not willing to come to Me that you may have life.

I do not receive honor from men. But I know you, that you do not have the love of God in you. I have come in My Father’s name, and you do not receive Me; if another comes in his own name, him you will receive. How can you believe, who receive honor from one another, and do not seek the honor that comes from the only God? Do not think that I shall accuse you to the Father; there is one who accuses you—Moses, in whom you trust. For if you believed Moses, you would believe Me; for he wrote about Me. But if you do not believe his writings, how will you believe My words?

He who has ears to hear the Word of God, let him hear it. Let us pray.

Father, as we examine now this testimony of Christ, we pray that the full impact of its truth may pierce our souls, penetrate between bone and marrow, that we may be changed by this truth. For we ask these things in the name of Christ. Amen.

Jesus on Trial

“Do you swear to tell the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth, so help you God?” Everyone knows from where those words originate. Those are the words that are customarily used in a courtroom when people are sworn in. By swearing an oath before God, they promise that their testimony will be true and not an exercise in perjury.

The idea of giving true witness in a law court was so important to Israel that when God fashioned the bedrock constitution of His people, the Ten Commandments, He included a law against bearing false witness. In the Old Testament, in cases of capital crimes tried at the gate before the judges of the land, before the death penalty could be given, there had to be at least two eyewitnesses to the crime who gave testimony. Their testimony had to agree completely. There were strong sanctions in Israel against anyone who bore false witness in the case of a capital crime. The witnesses were subject to the death penalty. Great care was taken about how the truth could be discerned in the context of a trial.

The reason I go over that background is that the section I have just read has to do with charges being brought against Jesus by His contemporaries, the officials of the Jewish community. We saw what preceded this particular chapter, where He was charged with violating the Sabbath law for ordering a man to pick up his bed and to carry it. The language of this text is bathed in the legalese of the first-century Jewish community. We need to understand that, lest we get confused or misled by the statements that we read.

Witnesses of Jesus

The first statement is striking. Jesus said, “If I bear witness of Myself, My witness is not true.” How many times in Scripture does Jesus make statements about His own mission, His own work, and His own identity? He does it over and over again, yet here He says, “If I bear witness to Myself, My witness is not true.”

Is Jesus telling us, then, not to believe Him whenever He declares who He is or what His mission is? No, He is speaking here in the context of the legal community. He is saying that, legally, “My testimony is not valid in a courtroom unless it is verified or corroborated by other sources.”

Recently, at the office, I had to sign some documents for a bank, and there was a place for me to write my name at the bottom of this official document. Then the next section had a line for someone to sign who was a witness to this transaction.

Now, suppose I had signed my name on the left, as the first party, and then, on the line that called for a witness, I put my name there too. That would not work because I cannot bear witness to my own witness. I need someone else to confirm that I was the one who signed on the first line. I cannot sign the second line proving that I was the one who signed the first line.

That is what Jesus means when He says here, “If I bear witness of Myself, My witness is not true.” That means it is not true in the sense that it is not valid in the courtroom. But He says, “There is another who bears witness of Me, and I know that the witness which He witnesses of Me is true.” Here He is, of course, referring to God Himself.

Then Jesus adds regarding John the Baptist: “You have sent to John, and he has borne witness to the truth. Yet I do not receive testimony from man, but I say these things that you may be saved. He was the burning and shining lamp, and you were willing for a time to rejoice in his light.”

Remember that John the Baptist, at this time in Jewish history, when Jesus uttered these words, was more famous than Jesus was. John created a national stir when he appeared, coming out of the wilderness and baptizing people at the Jordan. This was because John had restored the office of the Old Testament prophet to the land after God had been silent in Israel for four hundred years. Every Jew in Israel had heard of John the Baptist, and before his life was taken by the whim of Herod, he was extremely popular. Jesus described him as a burning and shining light. It was a light that brought not only illumination, but also intense heat. In contemporary language, we could say “John was hot” at this time in the nation’s history. He was a burning and shining lamp before the people, and Jesus reminds the leaders of Israel, “There was a time when you basked in the light of John.”

When we started this study of the Gospel of John, in the very first chapter, we were introduced to John the Baptist. We were told there that He was not the light that lights every man coming into the world, but his task was to bear witness to the light. Jesus is saying, in the context of the courtroom: “My primary witness in this world was John the Baptist. He bore witness to Me. He announced Me to you. He’s the one who said, ‘Behold the Lamb of God, who takes away the sin of the world.’ But now you don’t believe him, even though for a time you basked in the glory of his light.”

The Authentication of Miracles

“But I have a greater witness than John’s,” Jesus says, “for the works which the Father has given Me to finish—the very works that I do—bear witness of Me, that the Father has sent Me. And the Father Himself, who sent Me, has testified of Me.” Let me comment on that briefly. Jesus shows us something that was not strange in His day but that we tend to overlook every time it comes up in the New Testament, and that is the purpose and function of miracles.

I have talked about this before because the biblical purpose of miracles has been all but eclipsed in the contemporary church. Some people today look at the biblical miracles, and they say, “The miracles of the New Testament prove the existence of God.” No, they do not.

The existence of God is made manifest and proven long before a single miracle takes place. In other words, for a miracle to be recognized as such presupposes the existence of God. This is because a miracle, technically defined, is a work that only God can do, such as bringing something out of nothing and bringing life out of death.

That is why I have pleaded with people not to believe that Satan can do actual miracles. He can perform counterfeit tricks, but he cannot do what God can do. He cannot bring something out of nothing, and he cannot bring life out of death. Those are things that only God can do. The significance of miracles in the New Testament is what the philosopher John Locke once described as “the crediting of the proposer.” The presence of a miracle authenticates that the messenger has been sent from God.

Just a couple of chapters earlier, in John 3, we saw Nicodemus coming to Jesus at night. Do you remember his opening words? “Good teacher, we know that You are a teacher sent from God, or you would not be able to do the things that You do.” That was sound reasoning. He understood that it is impossible to perform miracles unless God is endorsing you.

That is why you have to be careful with your understanding of miracles in our day, because there are theological swindlers of the worst kind who claim to be performing miracles. If they really are performing miracles, then their writings ought to go in the next edition of the New Testament, because God is authenticating them as agents of revelation—which, of course, He is not doing.

In any case, Jesus appeals to His miracles as a corroborative witness to His claims. He says, essentially: “The Father is bearing witness to Me by giving Me the power to perform the miracles that you have seen. If you won’t believe My words, believe Me for My works’ sake. My works should be enough to prove to you that I am the One whom the Father sent.”

Notice that Jesus is not saying, “By doing My works, I am proving that I am the Son of God.” No, He is saying, “The works that I am doing, works that only God could do, are evidence that God is authenticating My identity.” That is the point He is making.

God’s Voice

Then Jesus says: “You have neither heard His voice at any time, nor seen His form. But you do not have His word abiding in you, because whom He sent, Him you do not believe.” These people obviously had not been present at Jesus’ baptism, because on that occasion, the voice of God was audible.

Remember that when the dove came upon Jesus at His baptism, the heavens opened, and a voice was heard from heaven, saying, “This is My beloved Son, in whom I am well pleased” (Matt. 3:17). God gave audible testimony to His Son.

As I have mentioned before, three times the New Testament tells us that God speaks audibly. On every one of those occasions, God is calling attention to the identity of Jesus as His Son. “This is My Son,” the voice from heaven says. “Hear Him. Listen to Him.”

Even on that occasion, not everyone who was present understood the words, because we are told some thought it was thunder. To those who did not have ears to hear the voice of God, the voice was muffled, lest they hear. But those whose hearts were opened to the things of God heard distinctly what the Father said: “This is My Son.”

His Word Abiding in You

So far, we have John the Baptist bearing witness, the miracles of Christ bearing witness, and the audible voice of the Father Himself bearing witness. I am going to repeat a point I have made many times—I will probably never get tired of saying it—because I still see the bumper stickers out there. My protests to the contrary fall on deaf ears; I still see them. They say: “God said it. I believe it. That settles it.” How arrogant is that?

We are going to write a new bumper sticker, and what is it going to say? “God says it. That settles it.” It does not matter whether I believe it. It is settled long before my assent, long before I concur with the message. If God Almighty opens His holy mouth and declares something, we do not need another witness. It is over. It is settled.

Jesus says, essentially: “You have John the Baptist, but I’m not depending upon human witness. You’ve seen the miracles; they don’t convince you. My God, My Father, testified from heaven itself.” The defense attorney has a parade of witnesses to bring before the court. Listen to this rebuke. This is scary: “You do not have His word”—that is, the Word of God—“abiding in you.”

How does Jesus know that? He says, “Whom He sent, Him you do not believe.” He continues, “You search the Scriptures.” Do you realize He is not talking to liberals or secularists? He is talking to card-carrying fundamentalists, people who would not think about going to church on Sunday morning without carrying their Bible, people who would have with them at all times “Baptist air-conditioning.”

Do you know what Baptist air-conditioning is? Presbyterians do not understand that. That is the air currents that are made by people leafing through their Bibles during the sermon. That creates what is called Baptist air-conditioning. That is a compliment to the Baptists. The Baptists, when they go to church on Sunday morning, take their Bibles with them.

Jesus says, in essence: “You have Bible study every week. You don’t just have a fifteen-minute daily devotional, but you search the Scriptures. You are disciplined students of the Scriptures because you think that in studying them, you have eternal life. How can you read these Scriptures and not believe in Me?”

Do you remember how, on the road to Emmaus after the resurrection, Christ fell in with two people who were so dejected after the events in Jerusalem that they were hanging their heads and moaning? Jesus asked: “What’s going on? What’s the matter?” They answered, “Don’t you know what went on in Jerusalem?” Jesus replied, “Tell me about it.” The men said: “We hoped that this Jesus was going to be the Messiah, but they killed Him. Now some of the women are suggesting that He was raised from the dead. But you know you can’t believe old wives’ tales like that.”

What did Jesus say? Beginning with Moses, He went through the entire Old Testament with these people, who should have known better, and explained to them how the Scriptures testified to Him again and again. But when the Messiah whom the Old Testament taught on every page appeared in the midst of the people, “He came to His own, and His own did not receive Him” (John 1:11). “The light has come into the world, and men loved darkness rather than the light” (John 3:19). They brought that darkness with them, even when they searched the Scriptures.

We Refuse to Honor God

How easy it is for us, two thousand years removed from the first century, to look back in a spirit of judgment and condemnation on those foolish people. But we are in danger of doing the same thing today. Jesus says, “You are not willing to come to Me.” That is why they do not listen to His voice. They do not want to come to Him.

Several years ago, I was invited to a college to lecture on the existence of God by a campus group called the Atheist Club. So, it wasn’t a pleasant dialogue. I went to Romans 1 and talked about how God had clearly revealed Himself to every creature, and how that knowledge gets through to every person. As much as we fight and kick against it, we cannot extinguish or obliterate that light. We are left, according to the Apostle, without excuse. Our problem is not that we do not know that God exists. Our problem is that we refuse to acknowledge the God whom we know to be true.

I said to those young people who were assembled in the Atheist Club: “I’ll be glad to talk about the intellectual issues regarding theism with you, but I want you to know where I’m coming from. I don’t believe for a moment that your struggle with the existence of God is an intellectual one. Your struggle is a moral problem. You don’t want to affirm the existence of God because you know what it’s going to cost you, and so you deny it because you don’t want it to be true.” But that is what Jesus is saying:

You are not willing to come to Me that you may have life.

I do not receive honor from men. But I know you, that you do not have the love of God in you. I have come in My Father’s name, and you do not receive Me; if another comes in his own name, him you will receive.

The art in the back of our church building, painted by Richard Serrin, graphically characterizes the choice of the cross. With triumph in the background stands Barabbas, the people’s choice, fulfilling the very prophecy that Jesus speaks of here: “Another will come in his own name. You’ll embrace him. You’ll believe him without the benefit of these witnesses.”

Jesus continues, “How can you believe, who receive honor from one another, and do not seek the honor that comes from the only God?” Someone recently asked me, “How can you get a famous, busy person to make time in their schedule to come and speak for you or visit you?” I said: “That’s easy. Give them an honor. Promise them an honorary degree, give them a monument or a plaque, and invite them to come give a presentation.” Jesus understands human beings. “You love to honor one another, but you refuse to honor the Son of God.”

Moses Wrote About Me

“Do not think that I shall accuse you to the Father; there is one who accuses you—Moses, in whom you trust. For if you believed Moses, you would believe Me; for he wrote about Me.” That is a controversial text. Those of you who are students of theology or biblical studies know that higher critical theorists deny that Moses wrote anything. They say that the Pentateuch was compiled over many centuries by different editors and redactors and Moses did not have anything to do with it. Instead, the four authors, J, E, D, and P, put it together.

That provoked a crisis in biblical scholarship, not only with the credibility of Moses, but also with the credibility of Jesus. You should see the gymnastics people go through to get around this text where our Lord Himself pronounces publicly, “Moses wrote of Me.” We have Jesus’ declaration that Moses wrote of His authority, despite the Graf-Wellhausen theory to the contrary.

The point is that now scholars say: “Jesus was wrong in what He taught about earthly things. He couldn’t possibly know the truth, that it wasn’t Moses who wrote it.” We have a whole generation of scholars who do not believe Jesus concerning earthly things but do believe Him concerning heavenly things—the very thing that He Himself announced as foolishness.

In this text, we have a dominical affirmation of Moses’ authorship of the Pentateuch, and Jesus turns this on His critics. He says: “You call yourselves the disciples of Moses. You trust in the teaching of Moses. You exalt the Torah. It’s Torah this, Torah that. But you don’t believe it, because what Moses was writing about was Me. Don’t you understand that when he described the tabernacle, he was describing Me? Don’t you understand that when Moses said in Deuteronomy, ‘There will come another prophet like me,’ he was referring to Me?” Jesus is saying, “If you don’t believe his writings, how are you going to believe Mine?”

When the question of Jesus’ testimony comes up in the law court, four witnesses come forth: John the Baptist, the works of Jesus, the audible testimony of the Father, and the testimony of sacred Scripture through the authorship of Moses. If that is not enough to convince people, what is?

Times of Ignorance

I do not think the last of this discussion is heard until the book of Acts. When Paul addresses the philosophers at the Areopagus in Athens, he sees them worshipping at an altar to an unknown God. He says in Acts 17:30, “Truly, these times of ignorance God overlooked, but now . . .”

Do you see the change in historical circumstances? Paul is saying: “There was a time when God was forbearing with your pagan religion and your ignorance. God was long-suffering. He was merciful. He was patient. God put up with this for a long, long time. But now, He commands all men everywhere to repent.”

How different that is from modern techniques of evangelism. Essential to modern evangelism is the invitation. Notice the Apostle does not say, “But now God invites all men to repent,” because an invitation is something you can decline with impunity. You send it back. You RSVP: “I cannot come. Sorry, I can’t make it.”

Paul says that God “commands all men everywhere to repent, because He has appointed a day on which He will judge the world in righteousness by the Man whom He has ordained. He has given assurance of this to all by raising Him from the dead” (Acts 17:30–31). You want more testimony than that? You want more evidence than that? You want more proof than that? You are not going to get it.

God said, in essence: “I’ve made it clear to the whole world that this is My begotten Son, and the days of patience and forbearance are over. Now I command you all to come to Him because I’m going to judge the whole world through Him. I have proven Him to be the Judge by raising Him from the dead.” Let us pray.

Our Father and our God, we are so often like those of olden times, who were stiff-necked and slow of heart to believe all that is declared to us by Your Son. We thank You that You have proven to the world that He is Your Son, and that You are the one who sent Him. Give us hearts inclined to receive Him, that in Him we might have life. For we ask it in His name. Amen.

This transcript has been lightly edited for readability.