Blessed Are Those Who Believe

Lesson 7

Blessed Are Those Who Believe

(John 8, 12, 18, 19 & 20)

Copr. 2024, Bruce N. Cameron, J.D. Scripture quotations are from the ESV® Bible (The Holy Bible, English Standard Version®), copyright © 2001 by Crossway, a publishing ministry of Good News Publishers. Used by permission. All rights reserved. Suggested answers are found within parentheses. If you normally receive this lesson by e-mail, but it is lost one week, you can find it by clicking on this link: http://www.GoBible.org. Pray for the guidance of the Holy Spirit as you study.

Introduction: A church member discussed with me a topic on which we did not agree. She suddenly said to me, “My father was the president of a conference.” It was not until later that I understood this odd and off-topic statement. She was telling me that her opinion was important (and perhaps right) because she was the daughter of an important man in the church. Do we think we are right in our religious views because of our parents or our associates? In a recent study, the Samaritan woman at the well asked Jesus if He was more important than Jacob. This week Jewish leaders ask Jesus if He is more important than Abraham. What is the significance of these relationships? Are the views of those who went before us of value? Let’s plunge into our study of the Bible and look at the witness of important people in the Bible!

1. Abraham
   
   1. Read John 8:48. Assume you are in an debate with someone and they assert that you are the essence of evil and have bad genes. How would you respond?
   2. Read John 8:49-50. How does Jesus answer this charge against Him? (He denies that He is possessed by evil, and then asserts that His actions show this. Finally, Jesus makes the response of a logician. Calling Me bad names is simply an attack on Me, it is not a logical argument. God will judge.)
   3. Read John 8:51-53. Consider this new attack on Jesus. Is it logical? (Part of it is. How can Jesus say that if someone follows Him he will not die, yet Abraham and all the prophets who previously lived died? Jesus must be claiming to be greater than Abraham and the prophets.)
      1. If you were Jesus how would you answer this charge?
   4. Read John 8:54-56. How do you understand Jesus’ response? (He is saying that He is greater. He personally knows God. Abraham looked forward to the day that Jesus would come!)
      1. What does it mean that Abraham “saw” Jesus coming to earth? (Read Genesis 12:3. God revealed to Abraham that Jesus would come. This is a claim to be the Messiah, One endorsed by Abraham!)
   5. Read John 8:57. Does this suggest that Jesus looks old for His age?
      1. How would you view Jesus’ answer about His relationship to God if you were one of the Jews speaking to Him?
   6. Read John 8:58-59. When you tell people that you are older than they are, do they throw rocks at you? What is going on here? (Jesus’ statement that He is “I Am” brought to their minds Exodus 3:14. Jesus explicitly claims to be God.)
   7. Let’s consider the relationship claims being made. The Jews in John 8:53 call Abraham their “father,” and they ask Jesus who He claims to be. He responds that He is God, the one promised to Abraham. How should the Jews have reacted? What should be our response? (We have two choices. Either we believe Jesus’ claim, or we know that He is crazy. I don’t see any other choices.)
2. Thomas
   
   1. Read John 20:24-25. Why would Thomas have this attitude? Did he think his fellow disciples were all liars? Did he think that Jesus’ promise that He would rise from the dead was a lie? (I don’t think Thomas believed they were all liars. Instead, I think Thomas, just like all of us, was filled with pride. His pride was injured and he was deeply disappointed that Jesus appeared to others, but not to him.)
   2. Read John 20:26-28. Assuming pride is Thomas’s problem, what do you think about Jesus’ response? (What a comfort! Jesus goes the additional mile to convince Thomas. He does not say, “Get over your pride.”)
   3. Read John 20:29. Is this a rebuke?
   4. What should we now think about Jesus saying that He is “I Am?” Do we have sufficient grounds to believe, rather than conclude Jesus was crazy? (Thomas gives us rather specific proof. Not only that Jesus is alive, but this is evidence that Jesus was crucified. Plus we see that Thomas is a reluctant believer.)
3. Mary
   
   1. Read John 12:1-3. What is significant about Lazarus eating with the group? (He is the formerly dead guy. Jesus raised him to life.)
   2. Read John 11:20-21. Recall that we previously discussed this story in this series of lessons. Why did Mary not come out to see Jesus? Why only Martha?(Mary is mad at Jesus. He let Lazarus die.)
   3. Read John 11:32-33. What do you think Mary thought Jesus should say in response to her charge? (Mary is weeping. I don’t think she is clearly thinking this through. She just knows that Jesus let her down.)
   4. Re-read John 12:3. What does this tell us about the change in Mary’s attitude? (Lazarus has been raised to life by Jesus and Mary’s life has been restored to what it was before.)
      1. We started out talking about relationships. How important is Mary’s relationship to Lazarus as we consider her witness regarding Jesus? (If Lazarus’s resurrection was a fraud, if it never happened, Mary would retain her former attitude of anger towards Jesus. This, is a powerful witness that the resurrection of Lazarus is real. Mary is now overflowing with love towards Jesus.)
4. Pilate
   
   1. Pilate was the Governor, the representative of Rome. Part of his job was, like a modern judge, to hear cases. The Jewish Sanhedrin previously passed judgment on Jesus and pronounced the death penalty. However, the Sanhedrin lacked authority to execute its judgment. Thus, Jesus was taken to Pilate. Read John 18:28-29. What kind of a mood would you be in if you were Pilate? (We are told this was “early morning,” and the Jewish leaders would not come into Pilate’s headquarters, so he has to go out to them. Being an important man, I would be annoyed.)
   2. Read John 18:30. Is Pilate’s mood improving? (I would be furious. The Jewish leaders are telling Pilate not to do his job.)
   3. Read John 18:33-34. Pilate ignores the Jewish leaders and begins his own questioning in his headquarters. Are things going better for Pilate? Is he being shown respect by Jesus? (It just gets worse. Jesus is now questioning Pilate.)
   4. We are not going to review the entire trial before Pilate. Read John 19:4-6 and John 19:11-12 to find Pilate’s view of the charges against Jesus. How do you think Pilate came to this view? (If you were a judge who is used to seeing guilty people, and you have been insulted by what is going on, what would be your reaction? (What do I care? Execute this disrespectful man. But that is not how Pilate viewed this. Something has happened in his conversation with Jesus to cause Pilate to seek “to release Him.”)
      1. Why is Pilate’s opinion so important? (Pilate is unbiased in this controversy. He finds that Jesus is not seeking an earthly kingdom, this is a religious dispute - and Jesus is innocent.)
   5. Read John 19:19-22. Do you think that Pilate believed that Jesus was the “King” of the Jewish religion? (He could not have thought that Jesus was a “King” who would challenge Rome, or Pilate would have failed to do his job. Pilate’s insistence on writing that Jesus was “King of the Jews” means that he thought Jesus’ religious claim was believable.)
5. John
   
   1. Read John 21:24. Does John believe that Jesus is God? (Yes. John tells us that we should believe him because he has a reputation for being honest.)
   2. Read John 20:30-31. What is John’s goal in writing his book? (To convince us to believe that “Jesus is the Christ” so that we “may have life in His name.”)
   3. Friend, do you believe? Eternal life stands before you. Why not right now accept that Jesus is God come to earth? You will have no more important decision than this.
6. Next week: Fulfilling Old Testament Prophecies.