With everything that’s about to happen — betrayal, abandonment, torture, crucifixion, coming face to face with wrath — Jesus doesn’t for a moment cease to love and serve his friends. He doesn’t take “me time” to rest and prepare for the trials (literally) to come. Instead, he strips down, humbles himself, and washes the grimy…

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Jesus comes doing ONLY good — restoring sight, restoring limbs, restoring life itself — but some still can’t see him for who he is, which John reiterates quite starkly in verses 39-40. The miracle that should have made a believer out of anyone is that which further fixes some people in their unbelief. They want…

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“Now Jesus loved Martha and her sister and Lazarus” (v. 5). To me, this is one of the most beautiful sentences in scripture. The naming of specific people is comforting; it’s so different from the generic “blanket” love of Jesus for all people that I heard about growing up, as if there’s no difference between…

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Jesus calls himself the good shepherd, who not only leaves the ninety-nine to go after the one lost sheep, as we learn about elsewhere, but also lays down his life for the sheep. There’s no way to truly plumb the depths of this great metaphor. Today especially, I just want to rest in the truth…

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The story of the man born blind has always been comforting to me, because I also have an “abnormality” — in my sexuality — that I can’t necessarily attribute to any cause. Like the man’s blindness, same-sex attraction seems to have been with me since I was born. I didn’t ask for it, I don’t…

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I’m with R.C. Sproul on this one; I believe the story of the woman caught in adultery is a true event based on eyewitness accounts, which is why scribes tried several times to place it into various texts. Somehow it landed in John 8, and I’m glad it did. I love the mystery behind it.…

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What a polarizing figure Jesus is! One group wanted to crown him king, another wanted to kill him. His own siblings, who for years slept under the same roof, didn’t recognize him as the Messiah. Questions arose about his trustworthiness, his education, his morality. At best, people thought he was unstudied; at worst, demon-possessed. All…

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Those with a desire for Christ are those to whom it is given by the Father. He draws them to his Son (v. 44), and Christ safeguards their salvation (v. 37). These and other passages throughout John 6 were personal favorites during my teen years as I transitioned to Calvinism, and they still amaze me,…

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