The gospel of John has the key hanging at the back door, and that is in John 20, beginning at verse 30. And many other signs truly did Jesus in the presence of his disciples which are not written in this book. But these are written that ye might believe that Jesus is the Christ, the Son of God, and that believing ye might have life through his name." Now, would you notice that John has a subject and an object? It's not enough for a book to have a subject, it has to have an object. It's not enough for a sermon to have a subject, it must have an object. You should be able to stop your pastor when he walks up to the pulpit and say, Pastor, in one sentence, what are you talking about today? And if he can't tell you, he's not prepared. And if he gets up and says, not today, I just want to talk out of my heart, he's really not prepared. He's had a rough week. John's subject is Jesus Christ is God. His object is you better believe on him or you're dead. Jesus Christ is God. That's the subject of the book. The object of the book is believe on him that you might have life. The word believe is used 98 times in the Gospel of John, and the word life is used 36 times. It's the book that talks about eternal life. Now let's go back to John chapter 1. As you know from your own Bible study, I'm sure, we have four portraits of the Lord Jesus. We do not have four biographies. We do not have four biographies of the Lord Jesus. I love to read biography. I think the most important part of reading is biography. I have in my library over a thousand volumes of biography. You could not write a biography of Jesus. In fact, John tells us that. He said you could never write a biography of Jesus. The whole world would not be big enough to contain the books. If you start writing about the Lord. I've written about a lot of preachers and missionaries. Spurgeon and Moody, and I just finished a series of five or six articles on Charles Spurgeon. And you research material, and you research material, but eventually you sort of come to the end. This is all you can say about some people, and for some of us it wouldn't take very long. But not the Lord Jesus. The world itself could not contain the books that could be written about the Lord Jesus, because he's exhaustless. He is the great I AM and He is absolutely exhaustless. Now John wrote his book that we might believe in the Lord Jesus Christ and have life through His name. Now turn to John chapter 1 where he talks about this Savior. Verse 15. John, this is John the Baptist, bore witness of Him and cried saying, This was He of whom I spoke, He that cometh after me. is preferred before me, for he was before me." This is the eternality of our Lord Jesus Christ. John the Baptist, physically speaking, was six months older than Jesus. He was conceived six months before the Lord Jesus. But in terms of our Lord's deity, he existed before John the Baptist. And of his wholeness, Have all we receive and grace for grace. Now this ties back to verse 14. The word was made flesh and dwelt among us and we beheld his glory, the glory as of the only begotten of the Father, full. Full of what? Full of grace and truth. Now Jesus Christ is the only person who can combine grace and truth. You stand before a judge in a court. All they're concerned about is truth. That's all they're concerned about. I have had to sit on the witness stand, and the judge doesn't say, now what do you think, or please be kind. What do you know? And you tell the truth, the whole truth and nothing but the truth, and the court determines truth, and there's no grace. But our Lord combines grace and truth. He knows the truth about you. but in His grace He still saves you. That encourages me. Verse 16, of His fullness. What fullness? Fullness of grace and fullness of truth. Truth is for learning. Grace is for living. A lot of people stop with the learning. Oh, I meet people at Bible conferences and they're writing with both hands. And right next to them they have a tape recorder and they're taping. Some people are bookworms and some are tapeworms. And they're writing. And they're taking down cassettes, and they're getting all this truth, and then they get in the car and snarl at their wife. Lots of truth, but no grace. Truth means light. Grace means life. Truth means God reveals Himself to us. Grace means we reveal God to others. And I need both. But grow in grace, wrote Peter, and in the knowledge of our Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ. Now, somebody's going to hate me for this, but that's all right. I've got some good enemies. Folks, the mark of a Bible student is not an inflated head. It's an ignited heart. Did not our heart burn within us? We've got more study Bibles today, and we've got all kinds of books, and I've added to them. But I tell you, that's not what makes a Bible student. And some folks are disciples of teachers. You know, I get letters in the mail saying, oh brother, if it weren't for you, I don't know what I'd do. And I write back and say, you better find out what you would do. Don't you pin your ministry or your life on some Bible teacher or some preacher. You've got the Holy Spirit living within you. You've got the Word of God before you. Now let Him teach you grace and truth. Truth for the living, for the learning, and grace for the living. The law was given by Moses, but grace and truth came by Jesus Christ. There's a contrast here. Now, throughout the Gospel of John, you're going to see this contrast. Moses did this, but Jesus did this. Now, Moses in the law says we should stone this woman, John chapter 8. What do you say? Well, he said, go ahead, but start with yourselves. Moses gave us in his writing the types of the Lord Jesus. Now watch this. You know it, but I'll remind you of it. Matthew was written for the Jews to say, here's the king. Mark was written for the Romans, here's the servant. Luke was written for the Greeks, here's the perfect man. John was written for the whole world, Jews and Gentiles. to say, here is the Son of God in whom you find grace and truth. Now, he says to his Jewish readers, you love Moses, and you believe Moses, and you study Moses. Matthew wrote to say, Jesus has fulfilled the prophecies. John wrote to say, Jesus has fulfilled the types. And throughout the Gospel of John, you find the Lord Jesus taking the types from Moses and saying, I am. I fulfilled these. Here I am. Let's look at it. Chapter 1, verse 29. The next day, John seeth Jesus coming unto him and saith, Behold the Lamb of God, who taketh away the sin of the world. Moses gave you a lamb whose blood covered sin for the Jews. God has given a lamb whose blood takes away sin for the whole world. The law was given by Moses, but grace and truth came by Jesus Christ. There's a brand new sacrifice. Chapter 2, verse 19. Jesus answered and said unto them, Destroy this temple, and in three days I will raise it up. There's a new temple because he says in verse 21, he spoke of the temple of his body. Oh, how the Jews revered the temple. Now, when John wrote this book, the temple had been destroyed. It had probably been out of commission for 20 years or more. And John said, there's a new temple. A brand new one. He's building a temple, and his body is God's temple. Chapter 3 is very drastic, because Jesus says to a Jew, there's a new birth. Now, a Jew would look at a Gentile and say, you dog, I'm born a Jew. We have the covenants. We have the promises. We have the Christ. We have the glory. We have the priesthood. We have the sacrifice. We have all these things. And you don't have anything. We are born right. And Jesus looked at the highest example of Jewish religion, Nicodemus, and said, I'm very sorry, you need a new birth. The law was given by Moses, but the law doesn't give birth. The law kills. Only I can give you a new birth. There's a new sacrifice and a new temple and a new birth. Chapter 5. Our Lord heals a man who'd been lying around for 38 years. And he did it on the Sabbath day, deliberately. Now, if a fellow had been lying around that long, he could wait one more day. But our Lord didn't deliberately. Our Lord healed on the Sabbath day. He did the same thing in John chapter 9. Here's a blind man. Our Lord could have waited. He didn't. Deliberately, he healed on the Sabbath day. You know why? He's saying the law was given by Moses. He gave you a Sabbath. But that didn't give you any rest in your heart. Oh, you could take the Sabbath day, and you could sleep, you could rest, your animals could rest. There's no peace in your heart. I can give you peace in your heart, and I'm the only one that can do it. Come unto me, all you that labor, and are heavy laden, and I'll give you rest. There is a new Sabbath. Chapter 6, there's a new manna. In chapter 6, they were talking about the manna that Moses gave from heaven. Our Lord had fed 5,000 people. And they said, what? That's very, very good. I mean, you took this bread on earth and you multiplied it on earth. But, you know, Moses did something greater. Moses brought bread down from heaven. And for almost 40 years, every morning, manna, that little round, white, sweet wafer landed on the dew, wasn't even defiled. And they had to go out and pick it up. If you didn't pick it up, you walked on it. And Jesus said, well, I've done better than that. The bread that Moses gave sustained life for the Jews. I'm the bread of life that gives life to the world. The law was given by Moses, but grace and truth came by Jesus Christ. There's a new manna. Chapter 7, there's a new water. Chapter 7 is a feast of tabernacles. And at the Feast of Tabernacles, they celebrated going through the wilderness. And one of the ceremonies they had was for the priest to go down to the pool of Siloam and take these golden goblets full of water and pour it out. And just about the time they were doing that, in memory of the water that came from the rock, our Lord stood up and said, if any man thirsts, let him come to me and drink a new water. Oh, Moses gave you water out of a rock. But I'm giving you the true water that flows from the throne of God. Chapter 7. Chapter 10 is a brand new flock. For centuries, the Jewish nation had been God's flock. We are His people, the sheep of His pasture. But one of the Psalms starts out, Give ear, O shepherd of Israel. The people of Israel were God's sheep. Abraham was a shepherd. So was Isaac. So was Jacob. So was Moses. So was David. But now Jesus says in John chapter 10, there's a brand new flock. There's going to be one flock and one shepherd, and I'm going to get some sheep from another fold, the Gentiles. And we're going to take Gentile sheep and we're going to take Jewish sheep and put them together. There's going to be one fold and one shepherd, a brand new flock. The law was given by Moses, but grace and truth came by Jesus Christ. Under the old covenant, the sheep died for the shepherd, but he says under this new arrangement, the shepherd is going to die for the sheep. In John chapter 14, you have a brand new house. If you'd asked a Jew back in Jesus' day, where is God's house, they'd say, well, the temple. At the beginning of his ministry, our Lord said, don't make my father's house the den of thieves. My father's house. Talking about the temple on earth. At the end of his ministry, he didn't say that. He said, your house is left to you desolate. Your house. There's a brand new house. What is it? In my father's house. John 14. Our many dwelling places. A new house. A new hope that goes with that. I go to prepare places. you. By the way, it's interesting to note that our cultist associates, friends, acquaintances, always go to the Old Testament to prove that when you die, you just go to sleep and there's no consciousness after death. They go to Ecclesiastes and some of the Psalms. You know why? In the Old Testament, the truth about the future, resurrection, heaven, was in the shadows. Everything was in the shadows. The Old Testament being a shadow of good things to come, says Hebrews. When Jesus came, he brought life and immortality to light through the gospel. And so you don't go to Ecclesiastes to find out what happened to your dead loved ones. You go to John or the epistles. A new hope that we have and a new home. In chapter 15, he says there's a new vine. For centuries, Israel had been the vine. God took Israel out of Egypt. He planted a vine in Canaan. Isaiah chapter 5. He planted the vine. And He led it out to tenants and said, I want some fruit. And all he got was wild grapes. He said, alright, I'm through with that vine. And so down went the vine. And today, Israel is not God's vine in this world. We are. He is the true vine. We're the branches. And He's helping us to produce fruit for his glory, there's a new vine. Speaking of glory, chapter 17, there's a new glory. The Jews like to brag that they had the Shekinah glory, the glory of God that rested in the tabernacle. Moses dedicated the tabernacle, God's glory moved in. And then they sinned and God said, Ichabod, the glory departed. Then they built a temple and the glory moved in. In the first 12 chapters of Ezekiel, he describes how the glory moved out. You've got to read it sometime. Moved out of the holy of holies to the threshold, then it moved over the threshold, then it moved out of the temple completely. The glory departed. But now in John 17, we have over and over again the word glory, glory, glory. Father, the hour has come. Glorify thy son, that thy son also may glorify thee. There's a new glory. Well, that's one of the themes of the Gospel of John. The law was given by Moses, but grace and truth came by Jesus Christ. All of these Old Testament types and figures are fulfilled by the Lord Jesus Christ. There's a second theme in the Gospel of John, not only a theme of fulfillment, but a theme of conflict. Turn back to John chapter 1, if you will, please. In the beginning was the Word. Now we stop there and if I were to ask you, is there another book in the Bible that starts like this, you'd say, sure, Genesis, right? In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth. In the beginning was the Word. Now, Genesis begins, in the beginning God, and then you have light, and then you have six days of creation. You have the same thing in the Gospel of John. In the first chapters of the Gospel of John, he records seven days of the new creation. In the beginning was the Word, the Word was with God, the Word was God. The same was in the beginning with God. All things were made by Him. And without Him was not anything made that was made in Him was life. And the life was the light of men. Thirty-six times in the Gospel of John you find the word life. There's no life without light. Let there be light! And there was light! Now, you'll notice in John chapter 1 a sequence of days. Verse 19, this is the witness of John when the Jews sent priests and Levites from Jerusalem to ask him, Who art thou? Good question. That's day one. Because you'll notice in verse 29, the next day John sees Jesus coming and says, Behold the Lamb of God. That's day two. Verse 35, again, the next day, John stood in two of his disciples. That's day three. You see, over in verse 43, the day following, Jesus would go forth into the Galilee. That's day four. Then chapter two, verse one, and the third day after day four, which puts us now on day seven, which really ought to be a day of rest, but he goes to a wedding and turns water into wine. That's interesting. Moses' first miracle in Egypt was turning water into blood. Judgment. The law was given by Moses. Our Lord's first miracle, he turned water into wine. Grace. Now here we have seven days of the new creation. Did you know you're a part of a new creation? Now to look at it, people wouldn't believe it. Look at some of the saints, they look like cheerleaders for an accident. You know, just, you don't see much of the new creation. Oh, we quote the verse, therefore, if any man be in Christ, there's a new creation. Old things are passed away. All things are become new. I remember one day when I was pastoring and a man and his wife came in, both of whom were members of our church. I knew them. He was there every Sunday. He was in my Sunday school class. He came in, he sat down, he said, Pastor, I've got to tell you the truth. He said, I've been a member of this church for years, and every weekend I'm dead drunk. He said, I go out on Friday night and get drunk. I spend all day Saturday getting over it so I can be in church on Sunday. He said, my wife knows it, my daughters know it, nobody else knows it. He said, what am I going to do? I said, you're going to get saved. You need to be saved. And he did. He knelt right there, gave his heart to the Lord. What a transformation. He went and joined Alcoholics Anonymous and started to witness to other people what the Lord can do for you. He said to me, he said, Pastor, you're a busy man. You've never been drunk in your life. If ever you run across this problem, tell him to call me. And I did. He became my special assistant in charge of helping alcoholics. And oh, I think he's still doing it. I'm not there, but I think he's still serving the Lord. What a transformation. Here's the new creation. But it's not a new creation physically, it's a new creation spiritually. He's changing people's lives. Here's Peter. Simon. Andrew brings Simon up and says, Lord, I want you to meet my brother Simon. Now, if you'd have looked at Simon, you would have thought, well, what do you got here? Our Lord looked at him and said, ah, yeah, your name is Simon. Your name's going to be Peter. Thou art, thou shalt be. That's the new creation. Thou art, thou shalt be. An angel showed up one day. Gideon was hiding in the winepress, beating out a little bit of wheat to make some biscuits and have some lunch. The angel shows up and says, The Lord is with you, mighty man of valor. Oh, indeed, mighty man of valor, hiding in the winepress. Thou art, thou shalt be. That's what God says to you. I know what you are. That's truth. I know what you can be. That's grace. Grace and truth came by Jesus Christ. We like to quote to the unsaved people verse 12 of the Gospel of John of chapter 1. But as many as received him, to them gave he power to become the children of God. Just look at that little phrase right in the middle of the verse. Power to become. That's the new creation. Power to become. You're discouraged today. You say, oh, I'll never make it. Yes, you will. Power to become. Grace and truth. Tell God the truth and he'll give you the grace. Back to chapter one. In him was life, and the life was the light of man. Without light you can't have life. If the sun went out, we'd die. And the light shineth, present tense, in the darkness. Where's the darkness? In the world. He's not talking about physical darkness, he's talking about spiritual darkness. The light is shining in the darkness, and the darkness comprehended it not. Now, that word translated comprehend has two meanings to it. It means, number one, to understand. You say, well, I don't comprehend. Because the word comprehend means get your hands on. There are some things I don't understand. I don't understand electronics. We have a son who He designs the chips that run computers. I don't know what he's talking about We have a next-door neighbor a young lad About to start University brilliant computer operator people call him up and he fixes their computer over the telephone He's brilliant. I don't know what he's talking about. I Don't comprehend it I can't get my hands on it Now, the light is shining in the darkness. In other words, the truth is going out, but people don't understand it. That's our problem. Would you walk with me through the Gospel of John once again, so I can show you that wherever the Lord let the light shine, the darkness couldn't understand it. Here, back in chapter 2, please. John, chapter 2. Verse 18, Then answered the Jews and said unto him, What sign showest thou to us, saying that thou doest these things? And the Jews require a sign. Jesus answered and said unto them, Destroy this temple, and in three days I will raise it up. He was talking about a spiritual truth. I am going to die. I'm going to be raised from the dead. I'm going to build a new temple, my church. Now, how'd they understand that? Verse 20, Then said the Jews, Forty and six years was this temple in building. Wilt thou raise it up in three days? They didn't understand it. The natural person, the unsaved person, cannot understand the things of the Spirit of God. He's blind. The world is in darkness spiritually. Look at chapter 3. Nicodemus came and paid the Lord a lot of compliments. We know you're a teacher come from God. No man can do these miracles that thou doest except God be with him. But Jesus, I'm not going to talk about those miracles. I'm going to talk to you about the most important miracle, getting saved. Verily, verily, I say unto thee, except a man be born again, he cannot see the kingdom of God. He's talking about a spiritual truth. How does Nicodemus, a brilliant theologian, respond? Nicodemus says to him, how can a man be born when he's old? Can he enter the second time into his mother's womb and be born? Jesus is talking about the spiritual. He starts talking about the physical. John chapter 4. Our Lord meets a woman at the well and offers her the gift of living water. Verse 10. If thou knewest the gift of God, and who it is that saith to thee, give me to drink, Thou wouldst have asked of him, and he would have given thee living water." What an offer. I'm going to give you living water. The woman says, Sir, thou hast nothing to draw with, and the well is deep. From where then hast thou that living water? He's talking about spiritual water. She's thinking about material water. This is all through the Gospel of John. You find it in chapter 6. Our Lord feeds 5,000 people. He preaches about the bread from heaven. And He says to them, now unless you eat my flesh and drink my blood, you have no life in you. And they say to Him in John chapter 6, how in the world can we eat flesh from this man? Verse 52. How can this man give us his flesh to eat? He wasn't talking about literal flesh and blood. And by the way, he wasn't talking about the Lord's Supper. Don't read the Lord's Supper in the John chapter 6. Why would he talk about the Lord's Supper to a bunch of unbelieving, rebellious Jews? He's talking about partaking of Him spiritually. He said, look, the man that came down, that man is a picture of me. It came at night. I came when the world was dark. It came on the dew. I came through the Holy Spirit. It came small. I came a little baby. It came white. I'm pure and holy. It came round. I am eternal. It satisfied. I satisfied. But that manna only sustained the life of the Jews. I give life to the world. Now, you can look at the manna. You can analyze the manna, you can take pictures of the manna, you can measure the manna, and you'll die. You've got to eat the manna. If you don't eat it, you'll walk on it. Now, I'm that bread of life. You've got to eat me. How do you do that? Well, he tells us how to do it. John chapter 6, verse 63. It is the Spirit that gives life. The flesh profits Nothing. The words that I speak unto you, they are spirit and they are life. How do you receive Jesus Christ inwardly? Through the Word. How do you feed on Jesus Christ? Through the Word. The Word became flesh. Now even Peter, with all of his problems, got the point. The crowd left in verse 66. In verse 67, Jesus said to his disciples, you're going to leave too. And Peter said, Lord, to whom shall we go? Thou hast the words of eternal life. He was talking about a spiritual thing, receiving him through the word. They were talking about something material. Now, all the way through the Gospel of John, you find this problem. The light shines, the darkness can't understand it. But there's something else. The word translated, understand or comprehend, not only means to get your hands on it, but it also means to oppose. To get your hands on something, to hold it down, to suppress it, to oppose it. All the way through the Gospel of John, you find opposition to the Lord Jesus Christ. That was a good point for me to introduce a simple outline of the Gospel of John. May I remind you there are no inspired outlines of any book in the Bible. I always try when I write one of my little b-books to say this is a suggested outline. There is no such thing as the outline of John or the outline of Romans. Ten Bible teachers could give you ten different outlines, each of which is good if they're following the text. The only book I can remember in the Bible that really is outlined for us is the book of Revelation. the things which thou hast seen, chapter one, the things which are, chapters two and three, the things that shall be hereafter, chapters four through the end of the book. That's the only one I know of. Gospel of John, here's a suggested outline, very simple. Chapters one through six, let's call opportunity. In chapters one through six, Jesus Christ gives people the opportunity to see him and to hear him. His word His walk and His works testify that He is the Son of God. His words, He preaches and talks to people personally. His walk, they study Him, they examine Him. His works, they see miracles happening. John selects seven specific miracles that he writes about. John chapter 1 through 6, opportunity. Now what did the Jewish people do with this opportunity? Look at John 666. That's a rather ominous number, isn't it? John 666. From that time, many of his disciples, followers, went back and walked no more with him. Jesus Christ gave them the opportunity to be saved, but they would not walk with him." Now, what does he do? Quit? No. In 7 through 12, you have a second division of the book. I like to call this division opposition. Instead of walking with him, they began to war with him. Look at chapter 7, verse 1. After these things, Jesus walked in Galilee For he would not walk in Judea, because the Jews sought to kill him. Can you imagine that? God comes in the flesh, and they want to kill him. Down in verse 13, however, no man spoke openly of him for fear of the Jews. Even the Jewish people said, don't talk about him. Don't bring him up. We'll get kicked out of the synagogue. Verse 19, Jesus says, why go ye about to kill me? Verse 25, the people said, is not this he whom they seek to kill? Verse 30, then they sought to take him. Verse 44, and some of them would have taken him. Back in verse 32, the Pharisees sent officers to take him. All the way through chapter 7 through 12, There's this opposition. Opposition. He talks to them about Moses. They oppose him. He talks about Abraham. They oppose him. He talks to them about the Messiah. They oppose him. Until finally, finally, chapter 12, you'd think after all that he had said and all that he'd done, they'd believe. Look at 1237. But though he had done so many miracles before them, yet they believed not on him. Isn't that interesting? Chapters 1 through 6, opportunity, how does it end up? Crisis number one, they wouldn't walk with him. Chapters 7 through 12, opposition, how does it end up? They wouldn't believe him. It gets worse. In chapter 13, our Lord leaves his public ministry to the world. Notice verse 1. Now, before the feast of the Passover, when Jesus knew that his hour was come, that's a theme that runs all the way through the Gospel of John. Chapter 2, he says to his mother, my hour is not yet come. They tried to arrest him, they couldn't. His hour had not yet come, but now his hour has come. What hour? His hour to die on the cross. It is our was come that he should depart out of this world unto the Father." Notice now, having loved his own. Now, the book begins, God so loved the world. And in 1 through 12, he's dealing with the world publicly. Now in chapter 13, he's dealing only with his disciples privately. It's interesting. You start to read the Gospel of Matthew, and the first time you find the word love, it says, this is my beloved son. Gospel of Mark, this is my beloved son. Gospel of Luke, this is my beloved son. I can understand that, God loving his son. Gospel of John, first time you find the word love, God so loved the worm. But the world didn't want him. He came unto his own, his own received him not. as many as received him." Now that's the group he's with, chapter 13, verse 1. Having loved his own which were in the world, he loved them unto the end. The Greek says he loved them to the uttermost. I like that. What does he do? In 13 through 21, the last part of this book, we're going to call it outcome. We started out with opportunity, they wouldn't walk with him. Opposition? They wouldn't believe Him. Outcome? They crucified Him. Now here's something very interesting. In the Gospel of John, Jesus said to His disciples, I am the way, the truth, and the life. I am the way. They wouldn't walk with Him. I am the truth. They wouldn't believe Him. I am the life. They crucified Him. That's the outcome of unbelief. But what happened to His disciples? They believed. When you read 13, 14, 15, 16, 17, you see the faith of the disciples being nurtured. I know they ran away. I know they failed Him. But not ultimately. Only immediately. They rallied. They were filled with the Spirit of God. And we're here today because they were faithful. Never forget that. The outcome was His disciples were edified, Jesus was crucified, but then he was raised from the dead, gone back to heaven, and the Gospel of John closes in chapter 21 with Jesus teaching his disciples, without me you can do nothing. Now we must go back to the Gospel of John chapter 1 once again. We've seen that the Gospel of John presents Jesus as the Son of God. It is a book of the fulfillment of the types. The law was given by Moses, but grace and truth came through Jesus Christ. We've noticed, secondly, that in the Gospel of John, not only do you see the fulfillment of the types, but you see people misunderstanding the truth. Whenever Jesus talks about something spiritual, they interpret it as being something material. Thirdly, We've seen that the Gospel of John records a war, a conflict between light and darkness, between religious people and truth, between truth and tradition, until our Lord Jesus is crucified by religious people. The interesting thing is this. Throughout the Gospel of John, you find witnesses saying over and over again, He's the Son of God. He's the Son of God. A cultist came to my front door one day, many years ago, and tried to tell me that no place in the Bible is Jesus called God. He didn't know his Bible very well. Of course, the translation he had, you wouldn't have found it anyway, because it was a false translation, a warped translation. Look at John chapter 1, and would you notice the seven marvelous names of the Lord Jesus? You see, names are important. We don't take names seriously. We really don't. I went to a graduation exercise some months back. Our next door neighbor, the teenage boy graduated. And they march these kids across the platform and read their names. And I only knew one kid in the class. So once he'd gone by, I wasn't too interested in anybody else going by. So I sat there with the list of all the names And I counted how many Kevins there were in the class. And I counted how many Scotts there were. You know, every generation has its names. But names don't mean much to us. I mean, here's a little baby girl and they call her Irene, which in the Greek means peace. And she's a war, she causes war all the time. She fights and fusses, but her name's Irene. See, our names don't always match. They do in the Bible. In the Bible, names were important. There are seven people in the Bible who were named before they were born. And those names were important. Now, what name are you going to give to Jesus? Well, in chapter 1, verse 1, the Word. In the beginning was the Word. God's Word accomplishes things. He spoke and it was done. That's not always true with me. You tell your children, now don't do that or do this. Might as well talk to the cat. Now Jesus is the Word. You would not know what's in my mind or what's in my heart apart from my words. How do we know what's in God's heart and what's in God's mind apart from His Word? Our Lord Jesus is the living Word. By the way, have you ever noticed in your Bible that whatever the Bible says about itself, it also says about Jesus? Man shall not live by bread alone, but by every word. The Bible is bread. Jesus said, I'm the bread of life. He's bread. Thy word is a lamp unto my feet, a light unto my path. I am the light of the world. This is the holy scriptures. He is the holy. Son of God. That holy thing that shall be born of thee shall be called the Son of God. The Word of God is eternal. Forever, O Lord, thy word is settled in heaven. Jesus is eternal. In the beginning was the Word. Whatever the Bible says about itself, it says about Jesus. You know what that means? The way you treat your Bible is the way you treat Jesus. You want to know more about Him? Here it is. So he's the word. Now the words are made up of letters. First thing I had to do in school was learn the alphabet. They know now much earlier than we did because they can watch television, I suppose, and learn it. We had to learn the alphabet. First you learn ABCs. Jesus is the alphabet that makes up the Word of God. He's the Alpha and the Omega. the beginning and the end. He's the A, B, C, D, down to Z of the alphabet of God. If you want to spell out what God is, you've got to come to Him. He's the Word. I notice in verse 7, He's the light. Verse 6 says, There was a man sent from God whose name was John. That's John the Baptist. The same came for a witness. That's interesting. A witness. to bear witness of the light. Now, wait a minute. There's only one kind of person in the world who has to be told the lights are on. That's a blind person. You know, if I walked up to you and said, I want to tell you something. The lights are on. You'd say, well, Wiersbe, you need help. I mean, I can see the lights are on. But a blind person doesn't know the lights are on. So God sent John the Baptist to tell people, hey, the light's on. You're sitting in darkness and in gloom, but the light is on, that all men through him might believe. Jesus Christ is the Word in verse 1. He is the Light, capital L, in verse 7. Would you notice in verse 18, He's the Son, the only begotten Son, who is in the bosom of the Father. He hath declared Him. He has led him forth. He has revealed him. He that has seen me has seen the Father. Now let's follow that. Verse 18 calls him the Son. Verse 34, John the Baptist said, I saw and bore witness, this is the Son of God. How do you know? A dove came down. When Jesus was baptized, came up out of the water, a dove came down and lighted on the Lord Jesus. By the way, spiritually speaking, that dove had been flying around all throughout the Old Testament. Noah turned a dove loose, never did come back. Looking for a place to land. Now just imagine that dove up there looking for a place to land. Genesis, I think I'll land on Abraham. Oop, he just lied about his wife. I can't do that. I'll land on Isaac. Oop, he lied about his wife. Land on Jacob. Jacob lies about everything. Let's just keep going. So he just keeps on flying looking for a place to land. Can't land on David. He committed adultery. And one day he looks down and says, well, there's the Son of God. I can land there. And the dove landed on Jesus and said, here's the Son of God. I notice over in verse 49, Nathanael says, thou art the Son of God. In verse 29, he's the Lamb of God. For centuries, the Jews had offered two lambs every day in the temple, one in the morning, one in the evening, in the tabernacle. Plus all the thousands of other lambs that were slain for one reason or another, and at Passover, my! But all those lambs could only cover the sins of the Jews. Now here is a lamb who takes away the sins of the world. He's the Lamb of God. He's the Messiah, verse 41. Andrew says to Simon, we have found the Messiah, the Christ, the Promised One. I notice that Nathanael in verse 49 calls Him the King of Israel. Thou art the King of Israel. Verse 51, our Lord Himself says He's the Son of Man. Now don't interpret Son of Man just to mean human. The phrase Son of Man comes from the book of Daniel, chapter 7, where you have that glorious vision of the Son of Man. That's a messianic title. A Jew using the phrase Son of Man was not talking about a man walking around. He was talking about the Messiah. And in this case, the Lord Jesus Christ. Thou art the Son of God. The book of John is a book of demonstration. He demonstrates that he is God's Son. How? By his walk, the way he lived. By his words, what he said. By his works, the miracles he performed. The sad thing is most of the people who saw and witnessed all of this would not believe. But a few believe. and said he's the Son of God. Here's John the Baptist. He's the Son of God. Here's Nathanael. He is the Son of God. Peter. Look at Peter in chapter 6, verse 69. And we believe and are sure that thou art that Christ, the Son of the living God. In John chapter 9, that blind man who was healed says in verse Verse 35, Jesus heard they'd cast him out of the synagogue and he found him. Because he always finds his sheep, doesn't he? Dost thou believe on the Son of God? Who said that? Jesus did. Some liberal says, Jesus never claimed to be the Son of God. What are you going to do right here? And the blind man said, Lord, I believe. Verse 38. Believe what? You're the Son of God. John chapter 11, verse 27, Martha says, Lord, I believe that thou art the Christ, the Son of God. Martha was no dumbbell. Thomas says, my Lord and my God, in chapter 20, verse 28. I don't know. As you read this book, you come to the conclusion that this one it's focusing on is the Son of God. And He's our Savior. He's our friend. and He wants us to become more like Him.