A Sure Thing: Signs of Life

 November 1, 2026

John 5:1-40

         A couple of years ago, I planted a lilac tree outside of the side door to our house. It is an unusual color as it has yellow blossoms instead of the normal purple. I chose yellow because this is Jennifer’s favorite color. Well, with the hot humid weather this summer, the lilac tree that had bloomed so well in the spring began to look sickly. The leaves began to wilt and turn brown, and it wasn’t too long until the tree was bare from top to bottom. Jennifer was certain that her lilac was dead but I, knowing how lilacs are prone to fungus infections, was optimistic that with cooler weather the lilac just might surprise us. Well, I am happy to report that not only did the lilac tree grow new leaves but here in the middle of October, there are even lilac blossoms filling the air with their familiar sweet perfume. What once looked so dead and forlorn is now defying the odds, showing signs of life even in this fall season.

         I thought of how life can spring up where we least expect it to, not just in dealing with our lilac tree but also in what Jesus tells us in the fifth chapter of the gospel of John. In this series of messages entitled, “A Sure Thing,” I am looking at the twenty-five teachings in thee gospel of John which stand out from the rest of the gospel narrative because these teachings begin with Jesus saying, “Truly, truly…” At least this is how most translations record these double sayings. In the original language spoke by Jesus though, the words spoken twice before these teachings is, “Amen, Amen…” These two amens spoke by Jesus state that here in the teachings that follow them are a sure thing, a teaching which is true and certain upon which we can build our lives upon. These teachings then prove to be a great comfort for us, those who live in uncertain times.

         Today we are looking at several more of the double men teachings here in the fifth chapter of John. When we read these teachings in the fifth chapter of John, we find that the subject of these teachings is life. In the twenty-fourth verse, Jesus teaches us something astonishing, that anyone who hears his word and believes the Father who sent him, they will have eternal life. This eternal life is ours to receive right now, from the moment we first believe which may be every bit as surprising as discovering lilac blossoms in October. So often we think that eternal life happens after we die, yet this is not what Jesus teaches us. No, Jesus is clear that we can experience eternal life in the very moment when we hear his word and place our faith in our Heavenly Father who has sent Jesus to us. The question then that we must ask ourselves is do we show signs that we are living just such an eternal life, today? And if we don’t, then why not?

         As we consider this question, let us look at the circumstances surrounding these double amen teachings found here in the fifth chapter of John. Jesus has come up to Jerusalem from Cana in Galilee so that he might celebrate the festival. As Jesus walked along the pools, found by the Sheep Gate, he came across a man who had been unable to walk for thirty-eight years. Now this number thirty-eight, is an unusual number, one that I believe John has put here to remind his readers of the number of years that had passed until all of the people who rebelled against God had died in the wilderness. Thirty-eight years is how long the next generation had to wait until they could at last enter the land promised to them by God. And thirty-eight years is how long this man had to wait to receive the long-awaited blessing promised by God.

         When Jesus sees this man who is unable to walk, Jesus first asks him if he wishes to be healed. The man answers that he has no one who will place him in the pool when the waters move. The belief of that day was that when the waters would ripple it was the angels who had stirred the water. In this moment those placed into the water could receive the healing from heaven. Jesus, though, does not place him the water, as the man expected. No, all Jesus did was to speak, telling the man to rise, pick up his mat, and walk. Jesus healed this man in a moment. So, the man picked up his mat as Jesus had told him to do and he began to walk.

         Now such a healing should have been an occasion for celebration, yet such was not the case. You see, the day when Jesus healed this man was the Sabbath. The faithful people of God who strictly obeyed the law became furious at seeing a man carrying his mat on the very day that God had commanded his people to do no labor whatsoever. The man who Jesus had healed tried to explain to these angry bystanders that he was merely doing what Jesus had instructed him to do. The bystanders then turned their attention to this one that had brought about this healing, the one who demanded that this man who had been unable to walk, now rise, take up his mat, and walk. Jesus, seeing that a crowd had gathered slipped away. Later that day, Jesus found the man he had healed. Strangely, Jesus told him to not sin anymore so that nothing worse might happen to him. Well, the man went and told the authorities that it was Jesus who had made him well, and this is why the authorities began to persecute Jesus, hunting him down and harassing him.

         Now when we pause for a moment and consider what had happened on that Sabbath day, there are several issues which should be disturbing. The first is that the man who had been unable to walk for thirty-eight years, never spoke a word of gratitude to Jesus for healing him. Not once was did this man utter a thank-you to Jesus nor did he ever offer any praise God for making him whole. This man only searched for Jesus in order is to take the blame off himself for carrying his mat on the Sabbath. Much like the ones in the wilderness who died in the wilderness over a thirty-eight-year period, this man who had been healed was worried more about what was going to happen to him than he was about honoring the God who had given him a life free from impairment. The admonition Jesus gave to him to go and sin no more becomes more understandable when we consider how ungrateful and self-serving this man turned out to be.

         Well, because this man whom Jesus healed decided to point Jesus out to the authorities, Jesus had to explain his actions. The answer Jesus gave to the authorities only seemed to make matters worse for after hearing Jesus explain why he had healed this man on the Sabbath the Jewish leaders wanted to kill Jesus. What had enraged the authorities is that Jesus told them that his Father was working until now and so Jesus was simply working with him. Jesus had already enraged the Jewish authorities because Jesus did his healing on the Sabbath, but when they heard Jesus claim that God was his Father, well such a claim was just too much to let slide. What did Jesus think that he was, an equal to God? Now if these authorities would have remembered their own scriptures that would have remembered that right from the beginning of God’s relationship with his people, he thought of them as being his first-born son. Through the rest of the scriptures and throughout the prophets, God is known as being their father many times. So, the real issue that the Jewish authorities had with Jesus is that God is clearly working with Jesus, this is the real problem at hand. 

         At last, then, we come to the first of the double amen teachings found in the fifth chapter of John. Jesus, speaking to the Jewish authorities gathered around him says this, “Amen, Amen, the son has no power to do anything on his own, he only does what he sees the Father doing for whatever the Father does, the son does likewise. For the Father loves the son, and he points out to him all that he is doing; and he will point out to his son greater works than these and you will be amazed. For as the Father raises the dead and gives them life so also the son gives life to those he chooses. The Father judges no one buthe has given all judgment to the son so that all honor the Son just as they honor the Father. The one who does not honor the son does not honor the Father who sent him.” What Jesus is saying here is a simple truth that any father would have understood which is that a son only does what their father decides needs doing. It is obvious from what Jesus says then that, as most fathers know, the son is not claiming equality with their father when they work with them, far from it. No, the reason Jesus was working is just that he was a dutiful son who was joining his father in his work.

         The bigger issue with what Jesus says in this double amen teaching is that here on the Sabbath God is not resting. The very reason God demands his people to rest from our labors is that God rests on the seventh day of creation. Yet, Jesus tells us that God, the Father, is working not resting as one would suppose. So, it follows that if God is working, even here on the Sabbath, then as his children it would not be right to rest while our father is busy at work. God is at work and not at rest as he was on the seventh day of creation, because sin has now entered his good creation through our rebellion. Sin causes people to suffer and when the weight of the despair found by living in a hurting world crushes us, God in his love rushes to help us. Now this should have not come as a surprise to the people of God for the reason for their very existence as a nation is solely that their ancestors in their slavery, cried out to God and God heard their groaning. This is why the songs they sang recalled that their God is near the brokenhearted, God is the one who saves the people who are crushed in spirit, as found in the thirty-fourth Psalm. 

         When God rescued his people from slavery he spoke of them as being his first-born son. Just as with human fathers, God expected those he claimed as being his firstborn son would learn from him his ways of caring for the hurting people around them. In the nineteenth chapter of Leviticus, God tells his people that they are to be holy as he is holy. A teaching of Jesus found at the end of the fifth chapter of Matthew describes what it means for us to be holy as God is holy. There, Jesus teaches us that as children of our Heavenly Father we are to always love all people, no matter if they refuse to love us in return. You see, our Heavenly Father makes his sun to rise on the evil and the good, and he makes it rain on the righteous and the unrighteous. So, to be holy as our Heavenly Father is holy means that we must love as he does, loving others without any expectation that those we love will show us any love in return.

         Now with this understanding of what it means for us to be holy, that we love with no expectation of love in return, then what our Heavenly Father expects us to do to as his children becomes clear. In the nineteenth chapter of Leviticus, God tells his people that when they meet a stranger, they were not to mistreat them. They were to treat the stranger who lives among them like family, loving them as just as they loved themselves. They were to remember that they had once been strangers down in Egypt, and there the Egyptians mistreated and enslaved them. What God is telling his people is that they needed to remember what it was like when they were strangers down in Egypt because it was God who treated them like his family, rescuing them as if they were his firstborn. So now, as his firstborn, they were to follow in the ways of their Heavenly Father, loving the strangers around them just like their Heavenly Father loved them when they were strangers in a strange place. In the words of Jesus, they had watched as their Heavenly Father had loved them when they were strangers, so now as the firstborn son, they were to follow his example and love those who were strangers to them. The love God shows to all people is that he makes the sun to rise and the rain to fall on all people. What this implies is that our Heavenly Father loves through his giving of life, and so, as his firstborn son, we too are to love through the giving of life. In this way, just as our Heavenly Father is holy because he loves and gives life with no expectation of love in return, so as his firstborn children who watch and learn from him, we also are to love and give life with no expectation of return. In his response to the Jewish authorities one Sabbath day in Jerusalem, Jesus teaches us that this is the certain way of life God expects of us. 

         Now what the Jewish authorities should have understood is that when Jesus showed his love to the man who had been unable to walk for thirty-eight years, he was did so to bring honor and glory to his Heavenly Father. The Father loved this man who was unable to walk, and he knew that he had suffered for an exceedingly long time. Our Heavenly Father had heard his despair when no one would ever stop to place him in the water. In such a situation that this man had found himself, it would understandable that he would be tempted to just give up and give into the darkness that overwhelmed him. He may have wondered just where is God when I lay here withering away, day by day? What he needed was to be certain that God was indeed with him. When Jesus entered this man’s life, he at last had found the certainty that he was longing for, the certainty called faith. Here in the presence of Jesus the man understood that here is life, the light of life scattering the despair and darkness that he once knew. Those who who are strangers to the love of God, those who have lost all hope, those who feel as if the entire world has come against them, in a real sense, experience death. Yet in the presence of Jesus, there they find the certainty of his love for them and in this love, they find life. Since their Heavenly Father loves them eternally then the life known through his love is eternal as well. This is what Jesus teaches us in his second double amen teaching that he taught that day, when he said, “Amen, amen, the one who hears my word and believes the one who sent me has eternal life and will not come into judgment but has passed from death into life.” The word Jesus speaks is the word of love for all, even those who are strangers to him, even to those who will not respond in love to the love that he offers to them. When this word which speaks of a heavenly Father’s love for them becomes certain, then a person finds a life founded on the ever-eternal love that their Heavenly Father has for them. This is why Jesus could continue with his double amen teachings by telling us, “Amen, amen, the hour is coming and is now here, when the dead will hear the voice of the Son of God, and those who hear this voice will live. For as the Father has life in himself, so also, he has given the Son to have life in himself. And he has given them authority to execute judgment because he is the Son of Man.” You see, as we learn in the fourth chapter of the first letter John wrote, God’s perfect love throws out all fear. Without fear we find we can love as God has first loved us, we can in fact love all people, at all times. So, when we meet a stranger, we can now at last, be holy as God is holy, loving them like we love our family just as God first loved us. And through our love we too can give life just as God first gave us life, for we now live an eternal life knowing that God eternally loves us. Amen and amen!