Chapter # 1 Paragraph # 8 Study # 4
May 21, 2023
Broadlands, Louisiana
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Thesis: Jesus, the One of whom Moses and The Prophets wrote, is the Omniscient God Who "knows" us all, in every thought and intent, in every moment of every day, without any problem by reason of billions of sentient persons, all of whom He "knows" with equal precision and detail.
Introduction: In our study last week we focused upon the declaration of Philip to Nathanael that he had found the Person of Whom both Moses and The Prophets had prophesied. In that study we considered the
impossibility of "prophecies" without precisely detailed omniscience. We saw that it is
that truth to which Isaiah appealed in multiple places for man's understanding that there is an all-knowing God Who has spoken words that have been written and have been
proven, as to accuracy, so that we may know the identity of the Infinite God so that we may deal with His reality and Truth. In the text before us this morning, such "dealing with" is called "believing".
For our consideration this morning, we are going to look into Nathanael's response to Philip's claim and how that led him into this thing called "faith".
- I. Nathanael's Responses To Philip's Declaration.
- A. He expresses scepticism as to whether "Jesus of Nazareth, son of Joseph" can possibly be the "Fulfillment Of All Old Testament Prophecies Regarding The Christ".
- 1. This was a "built-in" theological/cultural response.
- a. In the theology and culture of first century Judaism, "The Christ" would be "kingly" as suits the numb-minded Jews who had their own "Christ-notions".
- 1) These "Christ-notions" were rooted in what the Jews considered to be "indications of significant glory", i.e., in their fixation upon the "pride of life" which disallowed any/all connections with "humility": Note Isaiah 2:22 and its mandate from God to "Stop regarding man, whose breath is in his nostrils."
- a) The "glory" they sought centered around external factors, such as wealth, power to dominate, and, most importantly, "agreement with themselves" (He had to be what they thought He should be given the enormity of their blindness to true "glory").
- b) The "significance" of this "glory" is revealed by Jesus' question in John 5:44 and His declaration in John 7:18.
- 2) These "Christ-notions" blinded the Jews from understanding certain of the words of the prophets regarding Christ's "associations": Note Isaiah 53:1-3 (this fed into the hyper-critical attitude of the hypocrites who faulted Jesus for associating with the "publicans and sinners", as Mark 2:14-16).
- b. In the theology and culture of first century Judaism, "The Christ" could not have been "Jesus of Nazareth, son of a mere carpenter" simply because of the delusion of the idea that God had revealed everything about the Christ that needed to be known; though the fact that Jesus was going to have a powerful "Galilean" impact was revealed in those inspired Scriptures as Matthew 4:13-16 (quoting Isaiah 9:1-2) declares.
- 2. This was Nathanael's own admission that he was "a son of the Legal culture of the Jews".
- B. But, he accepts Philip's challenge; "Come and see".
- C. He questions the source of Jesus' "knowledge" of him.
- 1. Jesus took the opportunity of the moment to "reveal" His personal "knowledge" of Nathanael's inner character.
- a. Jesus said of him, "Behold, a true Israelite" which is best understood along the lines of Paul's declaration in Romans 2:29 in which we find a divine rejection of externalism and the seeking of praise from men.
- b. He also said of him, "...in whom there is no guile" (dolos), a characteristic of Jesus Himself as 1 Peter 2:22 reveals.
- 2. Nathanael's response indicated that he understood that Jesus could not have the kind of "knowledge" that includes any levels of "guile" without that "knowing" including a profound level of reality.
- a. Nathanael asked the "guileless", obvious question: "Whence do you have this kind of knowledge of me?"
- b. The roots of this kind of "knowledge".
- 1) Are first found in Philip's declaration to Nathanael: only omniscience can produce the writings of inerrant prophecies by Moses and The Prophets.
- 2) Are then found in Nathanael's understanding that "The Christ" would be the only One who could do as Hebrews 4:12 says in respect to "The Word of God" and His perception of the "thoughts and intentions of the heart".
- a) It is more than a convenient coincidence that Author-John began this Gospel by identifying Jesus as the "Living Word of God" Who has the ability to discern both "thoughts" and "intentions of the heart".
- b) When the more distant reality of written prophecies and their roots in omniscience is conjoined to the immediately present reality of "the knowledge of Nathanael's absence of guile", there is an immediate tsunami of all that is indicated in Jesus being the Eternal Word that overwhelms Nathanael and his "objections".
- II. Author-John's "Point".
- A. The contents of both his own writings and those of Moses and The Prophets make the "at hand" issue this: we are not dealing with dry facts that can be received or ignored without infinite ramifications.
- B. For human beings, who inherently focus on the immediate present when dealing with heavy duty realities, there is no greater issue than the fact that once we enter into the infinitely "present" eternity, the "present" is going to be the most important issue forevermore.
