Grace and Truth with Larry Jack - John 10:27-28

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Grace and Truth with Larry Jack – John 10:27-28


Grace and Truth with Larry Jack – John 10:27-28

Grace and Truth with Larry Jack - John 10:27-28

Who is John?

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Who is John?

by Ray Mossholder

Perhaps as I share you will understand better why God would choose John to do all this writing and especially his written descriptions in the book of Revelation. If you find that book difficult to interpret, you aren’t alone – many have found the same thing. But it’s like something Mark Twain once said. He is quoted as saying “It’s not the parts of the Bible that I don’t understand that bother me. It’s the parts of the Bible that I DO understand that bother me!”

What John wrote in the book of Revelation confirms Scripture throughout both the Old and New Testaments. Things like – there is an eternal Heaven where all Christians of every age in history will live with Jesus Christ forever. It will be a place of joy and no sorrow. It’s confirmed that Jesus Christ is returning for His Church – the body of believers who have placed their faith in Him. We further realize how terrible the tribulation of seven years will be and that there will be Christians during that time who are alive. Some of them will be martyred. There definitely is an eternal hell.

Now, let’s take a look at who the apostle John really was. In this day that is trying to do away with Christianity and all thoughts of the one true God, I have heard John called a homosexual, effeminate, Arnold Schwarzenegger coined the phrase some might use on John – “a girlyman!” Christ’s enemies say would this because three times in the book of John, John says he is the disciple that “Jesus loved.” Their accusation is blasphemous and if it were said about Mohammed there would be murders. It is so far from the truth that it might as well have come from another planet. John was every bit a man, a rugged fisherman, and one to whom Jesus fully entrusted with His own mother, Mary, while Jesus was on the cross.

John was the son of a fisherman named Zebedee. At the beginning of his life it was like father, like son. He learned the fishing trade early and pursued it hard until Jesus called him as a young adult. By that time John’s brother James along with Peter and Andrew were a team already. They had formed a fishing fleet – “The Sons of Zebedee” – long before Christ called them to be “fishers of men.”

Let’s see what else we can find out as absolute truth regarding this author, disciple of Christ, and appointed apostle by our Lord. We do know from the Gospels that John was one of the three that might be called “the inner circle” of Jesus. The other two besides John were Peter and James. Not one of these men were chosen because they were brilliant, superior in character, most flawless, or nicest. In fact, Peter so often put his foot in his mouth that it is amazing he didn’t have to travel with the chiropractor! And that should tell us something that is a major truth throughout both the Old and New Testaments – Christ doesn’t choose the kind of people that CEOs and major corporations seek out. They weren’t pedigreed or pedicured. Peter and John most likely stunk of fish when Jesus called them. Sitting here knowing that I have the privilege of ministry to nearly the entire world, I am living proof that Christ doesn’t only use the brilliant, Eagle Scouts, the flawless or even the nicest to be leaders in His Church. So if you feel that God can’t use you because of your faults, that’s false.

Jesus called both John and James “Boanarges” = “The sons of thunder” not because they knew how to keep their cool, but because they were like volcanoes and blew their tops often. Oh, did they have tempers! So if that’s one of your faults, it obviously doesn’t disqualify you from being a leader in Christ. Rough, tough, and ready enough, describes John. He was never a girlyman!

John was exclusionary. In Mark 9, he strongly scolded a man who was casting out demons because the man was not a part of the twelve. Jesus gently rebuked John for that and told him that it was impossible for a man to cast out demons and then speak badly about Him.

In Luke 9, John and his brothers wanted to call down fire from Heaven on the Samaritans who refused to welcome Jesus. The irony of that is that Jesus later, when he was in Heaven, did call down fire on the Samaritans in Acts 8 – the fire of the Holy Spirit! And Peter and John were right in the midst of it.

No one could claim that John wasn’t highly ambitious. In Matthew 20 he had his mother fight his battles for him! She went to Jesus and asked that her two sons be given the place of honor on the right-hand and left-hand of Him in Heaven. Jesus told her, “Oh lady, you don’t know what you’re asking.” The request caused many arguments among the disciples because they all wanted to be first!

John viewed everything as either right or wrong. He knew what he believed was the truth and nothing but the truth. The oriental idea that has shrunk the brains of many Americans – the belief that there are no absolutes – would be absolutely torn apart by John. Jesus Christ IS the absolute and so is God’s Word. John knew that far better than most Christians do today.

James, John and Peter were taken by Jesus to places where the other apostles weren’t invited. John and the other two stood with Jesus on the Mount of Transfiguration where Jesus shone brighter than a million noonday sun’s. He was a leader in the early church and for a period of time ministered alongside Peter.

Except for the book of Revelation, John uses the language of the everyday person. There was nothing egghead about him. He was scholarly without showing off. His scholarship in writing his books in the New Testament was in the accuracy and the experience of being side-by-side with the way, the truth, and the life (John 14:6). Like Peter and the other disciples – all except Judas Iscariot – John absolutely knew that Jesus was the only way to eternal life with God. And he knew how to hear what the Holy Spirit was saying so that he, like all the Bible writers, could write exactly what the Holy Spirit breathed (2 Peter 1:20–21) .

John never included his name to any of his writings, except, of course, in Revelation. It is obvious to any honest Bible scholar that John wrote the books we’ve shared. His style of writing is unquestionable and he didn’t write in a vacuum. John lived to somewhere very close to the end of the first century and there were multitudes of people who knew him and would have quickly challenged any attempt to say that he did not write these books. It is sad how people of later centuries try to disprove all claims of the New Testament being written in the first century but instead in the second or third century. They foolishly think they could possibly know better than the people who were up close and personal with the biblical authors for many years after Christ had returned to Heaven.

It wasn’t long before the diaspora, the fleeing of the Christians from Jerusalem in 70 A.D. because of great persecution, that John moved to Ephesus. John’s ministry in the latter part of his life was primarily to the churches in Asia Minor, an area which is Turkey today. He became the major overseer to the churches of Ephesus that Paul had planted and they had undoubtedly grown much larger from Paul’s time there. It is further documented that Jesus’ mother, Mary, lived with John until her death in Ephesus.

In 95 A.D. the Emperor Domitian began a hideous massacre of Christians. It would be just the about that time that John was arrested and sentenced to death in exile on the island of Patmos. He lived there in a cave called “the cave of the Apocalypse.” This must have been the hardest time for John in his whole life. Not only was Patmos a kind of living hell, but the churches he had overseen in Ephesus and Asia Minor were beginning to fall apart. In Revelation 2:4–5 the message John received was to the angel of the church in Ephesus “But I have this against you, that you have left your first love. Therefore remember from where you have fallen and repent and do the deeds you did at first or else I am coming to you and will remove your lampstand out of its place – unless you repent.”

“Your lampstand” was symbolic of the churches themselves and when threatened with removal you can imagine how hurt John was. First, this message was directed to his closest friends in Ephesus. Second, he no doubt felt that he had been a failure in keeping Christ the priority in the churches, even though that would have been his very message to them always. Third, he felt absolutely worthless on an island as remote to the rest of civilization as Patmos was. But remember this, and the saying is true, it is always darkest just before the dawn. John’s spirit would be lifted to a new high in recognizing he was now assigned to the supernatural revelation of what would happen at the end of time – the writing down of what he saw on that island that I have read to you at our websites – the book of Revelation.

There was much to sorrow over during John’s life. In 70 A.D. the entire city of Jerusalem was destroyed. Many of his friends were undoubtedly burned at the stake, fed to lions, or crucified like Peter was. Others had fled to the catacombs where they remained until their death. Both his age and his death sentence let him know that his time was very short. But the book of Revelation gave him the thrill of knowing for absolute certain that this world is not our home. And he was the first to see the fullness of where he was headed eternally with all those of us whose faith is in Jesus Christ. Thank God he shared it with us.

Some wonder how John was able to get the book of Revelation out of Patmos and into the rest of the world. The answer is that God was at work as He always is. Suddenly and miraculously, John had his death sentence removed and was released from that wretched island. He was allowed to return to Ephesus where he died at a ripe old age

According to many documents written at that time about John, after Christ ascended, James, John’s brother, was the first apostle to be martyred. John escaped martyrdom and outlived all of the other disciples. The last words John spoke are also well documented. He said “Little children, love one another.” He knew then what I know now – Christians must all hang together or each Christian will be hung separately. That’s as true today as it was in John’s time.

I think the truth of Paul’s words in 1 Corinthians 13:13 is what John would have wanted me to leave with you. And he learned this truth by making mistakes until he got it right. “But now faith, hope, love, abide these three; but the greatest of these is love.” That’s because without love you, no matter how great your faith in Christ, no matter how great your hope in Christ; your church or you, in fact all Christians profit nothing without love.

Realize that to escape his death sentence and being sent to the hideous island of Patmos, all John would have had to do was to say that Jesus was a false teacher. But he would have never done that because he knew who Jesus was and is. Do you?

Who is John?

The Gospel of John Chapter 20

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Now on the first day of the week Mary Magdalene came early to the tomb, while it was still dark, and saw the stone already taken away from the tomb.


So she ran and came to Simon Peter and to the other disciple whom Jesus loved, and said to them, “They have taken away the Lord out of the tomb, and we do not know where they have laid Him.”

So Peter and the other disciple went forth, and they were going to the tomb.

The two were running together; and the other disciple ran ahead faster than Peter and came to the tomb first;

and stooping and looking in, he saw the linen wrappings lying there; but he did not go in.

And so Simon Peter also came, following him, and entered the tomb; and he saw the linen wrappings lying there,

and the face-cloth which had been on His head, not lying with the linen wrappings, but rolled up in a place by itself.

So the other disciple who had first come to the tomb then also entered, and he saw and believed.

For as yet they did not understand the Scripture, that He must rise again from the dead.

So the disciples went away again to their own homes.

But Mary was standing outside the tomb weeping; and so, as she wept, she stooped and looked into the tomb;

and she saw two angels in white sitting, one at the head and one at the feet, where the body of Jesus had been lying.

And they said to her, “Woman, why are you weeping?” She said to them, “Because they have taken away my Lord, and I do not know where they have laid Him.”

When she had said this, she turned around and saw Jesus standing there, and did not know that it was Jesus.

Jesus said to her, “Woman, why are you weeping? Whom are you seeking?” Supposing Him to be the gardener, she said to Him, “Sir, if you have carried Him away, tell me where you have laid Him, and I will take Him away.”

Jesus said to her, “Mary!” She turned and said to Him in Hebrew, “Rabboni!” (which means, Teacher).

Jesus said to her, “Stop clinging to Me, for I have not yet ascended to the Father; but go to My brethren and say to them, ‘I ascend to My Father and your Father, and My God and your God."”

Mary Magdalene came, announcing to the disciples, “I have seen the Lord,” and that He had said these things to her.

So when it was evening on that day, the first day of the week, and when the doors were shut where the disciples were, for fear of the Jews, Jesus came and stood in their midst and said to them, “Peace be with you.”

And when He had said this, He showed them both His hands and His side. The disciples then rejoiced when they saw the Lord.

So Jesus said to them again, “Peace be with you; as the Father has sent Me, I also send you.”

And when He had said this, He breathed on them and said to them, “Receive the Holy Spirit.

“If you forgive the sins of any, their sins have been forgiven them; if you retain the sins of any, they have been retained.”

But Thomas, one of the twelve, called Didymus, was not with them when Jesus came.

So the other disciples were saying to him, “We have seen the Lord!” But he said to them, “Unless I see in His hands the imprint of the nails, and put my finger into the place of the nails, and put my hand into His side, I will not believe.”

After eight days His disciples were again inside, and Thomas with them. Jesus came, the doors having been shut, and stood in their midst and said, “Peace be with you.”

Then He said to Thomas, “Reach here with your finger, and see My hands; and reach here your hand and put it into My side; and do not be unbelieving, but believing.”

Thomas answered and said to Him, “My Lord and my God!”

Jesus said to him, “Because you have seen Me, have you believed? Blessed are they who did not see, and yet believed.”

Therefore many other signs Jesus also performed in the presence of the disciples, which are not written in this book;

but these have been written so that you may believe that Jesus is the Christ, the Son of God; and that believing you may have life in His name.

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The Gospel of John Chapter 20

The Gospel of John Chapter 15

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The Gospel of John Chapter 15

“I am the true vine, and My Father is the vinedresser.

“Every branch in Me that does not bear fruit, He takes away; and every branch that bears fruit, He prunes it so that it may bear more fruit.

“You are already clean because of the word which I have spoken to you.

“Abide in Me, and I in you. As the branch cannot bear fruit of itself unless it abides in the vine, so neither can you unless you abide in Me.

“I am the vine, you are the branches; he who abides in Me and I in him, he bears much fruit, for apart from Me you can do nothing.

“If anyone does not abide in Me, he is thrown away as a branch and dries up; and they gather them, and cast them into the fire and they are burned.

“If you abide in Me, and My words abide in you, ask whatever you wish, and it will be done for you.

“My Father is glorified by this, that you bear much fruit, and so prove to be My disciples.

“Just as the Father has loved Me, I have also loved you; abide in My love.

“If you keep My commandments, you will abide in My love; just as I have kept My Father’s commandments and abide in His love.

“These things I have spoken to you so that My joy may be in you, and that your joy may be made full.

“This is My commandment, that you love one another, just as I have loved you.

“Greater love has no one than this, that one lay down his life for his friends.

“You are My friends if you do what I command you.

“No longer do I call you slaves, for the slave does not know what his master is doing; but I have called you friends, for all things that I have heard from My Father I have made known to you.

“You did not choose Me but I chose you, and appointed you that you would go and bear fruit, and that your fruit would remain, so that whatever you ask of the Father in My name He may give to you.

“This I command you, that you love one another.

“If the world hates you, you know that it has hated Me before it hated you.

“If you were of the world, the world would love its own; but because you are not of the world, but I chose you out of the world, because of this the world hates you.

“Remember the word that I said to you, ‘A slave is not greater than his master.’ If they persecuted Me, they will also persecute you; if they kept My word, they will keep yours also.

“But all these things they will do to you for My name’s sake, because they do not know the One who sent Me.

“If I had not come and spoken to them, they would not have sin, but now they have no excuse for their sin.

“He who hates Me hates My Father also.

“If I had not done among them the works which no one else did, they would not have sin; but now they have both seen and hated Me and My Father as well.

“But they have done this to fulfill the word that is written in their Law, ‘THEY HATED ME WITHOUT A CAUSE.’

“When the Helper comes, whom I will send to you from the Father, that is the Spirit of truth who proceeds from the Father, He will testify about Me,

and you will testify also, because you have been with Me from the beginning.

The Gospel of John Chapter 15

The Gospel of John – Chapter 13

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John 13

Jhn 13:1	Now before the Feast of the Passover, Jesus knowing that His hour had come that He would depart out of this world to the Father, having loved His own who were in the world, He loved them fnto the end.
	Jhn 13:2	During supper, the devil having already put into the heart of Judas Iscariot, the son of Simon, to betray Him,
	Jhn 13:3	Jesus, knowing that the Father had given all things into His hands, and that He had come forth from God and was going back to God,
	Jhn 13:4	*got up from supper, and *laid aside His garments; and taking a towel, He girded Himself.
	Jhn 13:5	Then He *poured water into the basin, and began to wash the disciples’ feet and to wipe them with the towel with which He was girded.
	Jhn 13:6	So He *came to Simon Peter. He *said to Him, “Lord, do You wash my feet?”
	Jhn 13:7	Jesus answered and said to him, “What I do you do not realize now, but you will understand hereafter.”
	Jhn 13:8	Peter *said to Him, “Never shall You wash my feet!” Jesus answered him, “If I do not wash you, you have no part with Me.”
	Jhn 13:9	Simon Peter *said to Him, “Lord, then wash not only my feet, but also my hands and my head.”
	Jhn 13:10	Jesus *said to him, “He who has bathed needs only to wash his feet, but is completely clean; and you are clean, but not all of you.”
	Jhn 13:11	For He knew the one who was betraying Him; for this reason He said, “Not all of you are clean.”
	Jhn 13:12	So when He had washed their feet, and taken His garments and reclined at the table again, He said to them, “Do you know what I have done to you?
	Jhn 13:13	“You call Me Teacher and Lord; and fnyou are right, for so I am.
	Jhn 13:14	“If I then, the Lord and the Teacher, washed your feet, you also ought to wash one another’s feet.
	Jhn 13:15	“For I gave you an example that you also should do as I did to you.
	Jhn 13:16	“Truly, truly, I say to you, a slave is not greater than his master, nor is one who is sent greater than the one who sent him.
	Jhn 13:17	“If you know these things, you are blessed if you do them.
	Jhn 13:18	“I do not speak of all of you. I know the ones I have chosen; but it is that the Scripture may be fulfilled, ‘HE WHO EATS MY BREAD HAS LIFTED UP HIS HEEL AGAINST ME.’
	Jhn 13:19	“From now on I am telling you before it comes to pass, so that when it does occur, you may believe that I am He.
	Jhn 13:20	“Truly, truly, I say to you, he who receives whomever I send receives Me; and he who receives Me receives Him who sent Me.”
	Jhn 13:21	When Jesus had said this, He became troubled in spirit, and testified and said, “Truly, truly, I say to you, that one of you will fnbetray Me.”
	Jhn 13:22	The disciples began looking at one another, at a loss to know of which one He was speaking.
	Jhn 13:23	There was reclining on Jesus’ bosom one of His disciples, whom Jesus loved.
	Jhn 13:24	So Simon Peter *gestured to him, and *said to him, “Tell uswho it is of whom He is speaking.”
	Jhn 13:25	He, leaning back thus on Jesus’ bosom, *said to Him, “Lord, who is it?”
	Jhn 13:26	Jesus then *answered, “That is the one for whom I shall dip the morsel and give it to him.” So when He had dipped the morsel, He *took and *gave it to Judas, the son of Simon Iscariot.
	Jhn 13:27	After the morsel, Satan then entered into him. Therefore Jesus *said to him, “What you do, do quickly.”
	Jhn 13:28	Now no one of those reclining at the table knew for what purpose He had said this to him.
	Jhn 13:29	For some were supposing, because Judas had the money box, that Jesus was saying to him, “Buy the things we have need of for the feast”; or else, that he should give something to the poor.
	Jhn 13:30	So after receiving the morsel he went out immediately; and it was night.
	Jhn 13:31	Therefore when he had gone out, Jesus *said, “Now fnis the Son of Man glorified, and God fnis glorified in Him;
	Jhn 13:32	fnif God is glorified in Him, God will also glorify Him in Himself, and will glorify Him immediately.
	Jhn 13:33	“Little children, I am with you a little while longer. You will seek Me; and as I said to the Jews, now I also say to you, ‘Where I am going, you cannot come.’
	Jhn 13:34	“A new commandment I give to you, that you love one another, even as I have loved you, that you also love one another.
	Jhn 13:35	“By this all men will know that you are My disciples, if you have love for one another.”
	Jhn 13:36	Simon Peter *said to Him, “Lord, where are You going?” Jesus answered, “Where I go, you cannot follow Me now; but you will follow later.”
	Jhn 13:37	Peter *said to Him, “Lord, why can I not follow You right now? I will lay down my life for You.”
	Jhn 13:38	Jesus *answered, “Will you lay down your life for Me? Truly, truly, I say to you, a rooster will not crow until you deny Me three times.

The Gospel of John – Chapter 13