CONVINCED?

“While he was still on the way his servants met him with the news that the boy was living.

“When he inquired as to the time when his son got better, they said to him, ‘Yesterday at one in the afternoon the fever left him.’

“Then the father realized that this was the exact time at which Jesus had said to him, ‘Your son will live.’ So he and his whole household believed. This was the second sign Jesus performed after coming from Judea to Galilee.” John 4:51-54 (NIV).

The second sign? What was the first sign?

Just as God kicked off His creation story with a wedding, John records how Jesus began His miracle ministry at a wedding. After the first wedding, man messed things up but Jesus came to begin the process all over again. He turned water into wine, the best wine, as a sign that He had come to reunite people with God in a union as close as a marriage, and it would be a good marriage, filled with the wine of God’s Spirit. John was selective about the stories he recorded because he wrote with a specific purpose in mind. Each miracle he recorded which he called “a sign”, ended with a response of faith in those who were involved in it or those who witnessed it.

Why did he call them “signs”? A sign points to something. The purpose of John’s gospel was to point to Jesus as the Son of God so that His people would believe in Him.  “Jesus performed many other signs, which are not recorded in this book. But these are written that you may believe that Jesus is the Messiah, the Son of God, and that by believing you might have life in His name.” John 20:30, 31 (NIV).

John left his readers in no doubt as to the purpose of his book. It was not just an interesting and well-written story. It was about a man who was more than a man, the God-man, the Son of God and the one chosen and anointed by the Father to represent and reveal Him to the world so that the facts would speak for themselves of who He was.

The sick boy’s father believed that Jesus could heal his son and acted on His instruction, ‘Go home. Your son will live.’ Jesus did not need to be physically present to heal his son. The confirmation came when he learned that the miracle happened at the exact moment when Jesus had spoken the words, ‘you son will live.’

Why was this another sign? To what did it point? Jesus made claims beginning with “I AM” which incensed His enemies because they recognised how outrageous His claims were if they were not true. Since His opponents had already decided that He was a blasphemer and refused to weigh up the evidence, every time He said, ‘I AM’ was another nail in His coffin. This “I AM” was His witness to His authority and power to heal.

But, while they refused to be convinced, there were those who responded with simple faith to the miracles that were a witness to whom He said He was.

In the Jewish legal system, there had to be two or three witnesses in a court of law for an accusation to be valid. When the Pharisees accused Him of blasphemy, He called His witnesses — John bore witness to Him, the Father bore witness to Him and His miracles were signs to point to the validity of His claims.

His first miracle at the wedding in Cana in Galilee bore witness to His claim to be the source of the new wine of the Spirit. His healing of the dying boy in Capernaum spoke of His power to give new life to those who are dead in their sin. On both occasions Jesus did nothing more than speak the word and the miracle happened. John’s introduction to Jesus in the first sentence of His gospel was, “In the beginning was the Word…”

As the story of Jesus unfolds, John gathers evidence and piles on witness after witness to show his readers rhat the absolute authenticity of Jesus’ words…miracles…responses…all point to the same thing; this man, Jesus, is none other than the Messiah, the Son of God. However, the Jews in the main still rejected Him. Why? It was their choice.

What’s yours?

Acknowledgement

Scripture taken from THE HOLY BIBLE, NEW INTERNATIONAL VERSION®, NIV® Copyright © 1973, 1978, 1984, 2011 by Biblica, Inc.® Used by permission. All rights reserved worldwide.