Believe: 879. How far will you go to find the truth? He is among us.

Father, our attention has been focused on You. We've left things outside and we have deliberately come as a statement of worship and rendered You our voices and our hearts, in song, in praise, and now in our attention, our listening, our devotion to Your Word. Our worship continues and we pray that we would be rewarded as the Word of God says we would. You are a rewarder of those who diligently seek You. In Jesus' Name, amen.

Okay, I want to unravel the mystery. Your Bible is an amazing book. There are 66 books, Old and New Testament that comprise the one book. Thirty-nine books in the Old; 27 in the New. If you were to count up the individual number of verses in the Bible, it's a total of 31,173 verses of individual Scripture. That means there are exactly 23,214 verses in the Old Testament and 7,959 verses in the New Testament. But if you were to take all 21 chapters of the Gospel of John and tally up the number of verses, there would be 879. 879 verses in the Gospel of John and the key theme of the book of John is "believe." It is a word that John uses almost 100 times in the book. So now the mystery is unraveled. What we are doing is a week-by-week, verse-by-verse, chapter-by-chapter study on Sundays of the Gospel according to John.

It's something I've always wanted to do on a Sunday morning. I've done it as we've gone through the Bible before, but I've never done it where we have a series of expository messages that are homiletically crafted with a couple of verses or a paragraph that drive home a single point or two and that's something I've always wanted to do. And we're going to do that in Believe: 879. And here's why: because the promised result of plowing through these 879 verses will be increased faith. Increased faith. Your faith so increased that it can be on display, so to speak. So go with me to chapter 20 and I've had you turn there because this is one of the few books where the author's purpose is written in the book and he tells us exactly why he wrote this book. Chapter 20, verse 30: "And truly Jesus did many other signs in the presence of His disciples, which are not written in this book; [this book being the Gospel of John] but these are written that you may believe that Jesus is the Christ, the Son of God, and that believing you may have life in His name."

So our faith will be increased because of this book. I heard a story about two nuns and these two nuns were also nurses. And they had to go way out in the country to attend to a patient who was suffering from something. And so the nuns got in the car and they were driving out there; they didn't plan appropriately and they ran out of gas in the process. So can you picture two nuns standing on the shoulder of the road next to a car that ran out of gas? They just stood there, didn't know what to do. Finally a trucker drives up in his huge semi and sees these two nuns in distress and says, "Ladies, sisters, can I help?" And they said, "Well, we ran out of gas. If we could have some of your gas it would be helpful." And he said, "Sure, you can drain as much as you can use out of my tank, but I don't have a can, I don't have a bucket." So one of these nuns, nurses, got out of the backseat a clean bedpan and proceeded to drain a couple of quarts of gas from the truck into the bedpan and they got the gas and the truck driver sped away, waved. And now they're pouring the contents of the bedpan into the car and just then, a highway patrolman pulled up and just watched and eventually the state trooper, he rolled down his window and he said, "Sisters, I don't think it will work but I sure do admire your faith."

I want to say this morning, I admire your faith. No joke. One of the great joys is being able to be around such a faith-filled Scripture-loving congregation. But, don't you think that our faith could increase? Could get better? Could be like what Paul, when he wrote to the Corinthian church in 2 Corinthians 8, he said, "Your faith abounds." I want that kind of faith. I often think of the demon-possessed boy whose father came to Jesus and Jesus said to him, "If you believe all things are possible to him who believes." And that man was so honest with Jesus. He said, "I believe but help my unbelief." That's honest. "I believe You, but there's this little part of me that doubts. If you just fix that part..." "I believe but help my unbelief." And I think the Lord will do that in this series.

So today we just want to look at this opening statement, though it's not opening—he puts it in the back of the book. But we are opening this series with these two verses: John's purpose statement. And there's two verses and there's two ideas that John looks at. What Jesus did, number one, and what John documented, number two. What Jesus did and what John documented. That's verse 30 and 31 of John chapter 20.

Let's consider first of all what John says Jesus did. You'll notice he says, "And truly Jesus did many other signs in the presence of His disciples which are not written in this book." The first thing that is clear from this verse, in fact it's clear from reading any of the gospels is that Jesus' life and ministry was extremely active. He had a 3 ½ year ministry and all of it was packed full of signs and activity and work. If you have this idea of Jesus standing in a robe glowing on the corner with a halo going "Aww," you've got the wrong picture. He was very, very active. And the disciples saw it. They witnessed it. Jesus did them in the presence, it says, of His disciples.

So we have eyewitness testimony of what Jesus said and did. And the ones who saw it are called here "disciples." Now we probably have a reasonably good idea what a disciple means. Let me just say that disciple simply means "a learner; a student; a follower." And when you hear the term disciples, you probably think there's how many? You think of 12. And that is correct because it is most often used of the 12 disciples/apostles who were sent out. But the Bible indicates, like in Luke chapter 10, there were 70, seven-zero, another translation: 72 disciples that were sent out around the Sea of Galilee. In Acts chapter one, it mentions 120 disciples gathered in the upper room in Jerusalem. But most often, the New Testament talks about Peter, James, John, Bartholomew, Simon the zealot, etcetera. The 12 that we know; the 12 apostles and disciples.

Well, John was one of them and if you have ever done a study on the 12 that Jesus picked, you have to come to the conclusion that Jesus must have had a great sense of humor to pick the guys that He picked. I mean, they were not like the brightest bulbs in the batch. I think, if today people were to advise Jesus on a mission to reach the world, it would be very different than the people that He picked to help Him do that. Don't you think? I think if He would have gone to a P.R. firm, they would say, "OK, Jesus, here's our advice. Number one, You should go to the finest seminaries in the land and get the brightest, most erudite professors who know this stuff on Your team. Number two, it would be helpful if You had some pretty powerful, articulate communicators to really get to the hearts and minds of the crowd. That would help. Number three, we recommend, Jesus, that You get a few millionaires on Your team. After all, You want to reach the whole world. That's quite a budget to take this message everywhere. So money would help. Number four, You could get two or three pro wrestlers as bodyguards because You're going to say some pretty controversial things and You're going to need protection. And number five, we recommend that You get a really good musician or band that everybody in Galilee and Jerusalem knows, to attract people so they can hear this message."

Does Jesus do any of that? No. He goes down to Fisherman's Wharf in Capernaum at the Lake of Galilee, this little insignificant lake in the Middle East and gets a group of grubbers; fisherman—blue-collar workers. You get within three feet of Peter, James, John, and the rest of them and that odor of fish is strong. But He takes them. And this is the group, these disciples, that He says, "Let's change the world. Go into all the world and proclaim the gospel." Well, we're going to talk more about them later but we want to look at, is what John looks at. And that is, what they saw—the amazing stuff they saw. He calls them in verse 30, "signs." Notice the Word: "Truly Jesus did many other signs." A very important word—signs. Sēmeia in Greek. And this is what it means: a distinguishing mark. A distinguishing mark. It could be a miracle; it could be just an activity that is predicted in the Scripture. Whatever it was, they were distinguishing marks that would point to Jesus being the promised Deliverer, the promised Messiah, the King of Israel, the One that the Scripture in the Old Testament spoke often about. Jesus did signs that distinguished Him from everybody else.

Can you imagine what it would have been like to actually be there watching what they watched? And hearing the messages that Jesus preached? Or if at least we had them on DVD—amazing. Well, John, who wrote this gospel, also wrote 1 John, 2 John, 3 John, and Revelation, was there. And this is what he says. First John chapter one: "The One who existed from the beginning is the One we have heard and seen. We saw Him with our own eyes and touched Him with our own hands. He is Jesus Christ the Word of Life." See John didn't have some second-hand religious experience or something he got from a book; this is something he saw and heard. I mean, just think for a moment: they heard the Sermon on the Mount recorded in Matthew 5, 6, and 7. They heard the Olivet discourse in Matthew 24 and Luke 21 and Mark 13. They heard the upper room discourse in chapter 13, 14, 15, and 16 of the Gospel of John—they heard it. They listened to that first message and what they saw, on top of what they heard, they would never forget.

They saw withered limbs made whole. They watched as deaf ears were unstopped. They watched as those who were blind could now see, those who were lame could now walk, and those who were dead now lived after resurrections. They watched Jesus walk on the water. They watched Jesus turn water into wine. All of these were signs—distinguishing marks. And the greatest of them all was the resurrection from the dead. That was the greatest distinguishing mark of all as Jesus raised Himself from the dead. Now, when you here of a sign or a miracle, please don't confuse natural phenomenon with miracles. I hear people like to degrade the miraculous by saying things like, "Well, every time a baby is born that's a miracle. Every time a sun sets, that's a—" No it's not. It's a miracle if you and I try to pull it off, but it's not a miracle. That's the natural order of things.

A miracle is different. A miracle is when natural law is suspended and overwritten by supernatural forces. Now that's different. And that would be a sign—those would be miracles. And Jesus did a lot of them. In fact, the New Testament records 34 miraculous signs that pointed to Jesus being who He said He was. Thirty-four. Somebody tried to imagine what it would be like if Jesus were to do those same signs in a modern age, our age. And this is what they wrote, "He would be wanted by the FDA for turning water into wine without a license. He'd be wanted by the EPA for killing fig trees. The AMA for practicing medicine without a license. The Department of Health for asking people to open graves and raising the dead and feeding 5,000 people out in the wilderness. He'd be wanted by the NEA [that's the Education Association] for teaching without a certificate. OCEA for walking on water without a lifejacket and flying without an airplane. He'd be wanted by the ASPCA for driving hogs into the sea. He'd be wanted by the National Board of Psychiatrists for giving advice on how to live a guilt-free life. He would be wanted by NOW [that's the National Organization for Women] for not choosing a woman apostle. He'd be wanted by the Abortion Rights League for saying that whoever harms children, it's better that they had never been born. And he'd be wanted by the Interfaith Movement for condemning other religions."

Well nonetheless, Jesus did many signs, says John. Many of them. And he says, "Many other signs that are not written in this book." So there's a bunch of stuff Jesus said and did, John says, that I didn't include in my book. They are not written in this book. So here's what we need to know: the Gospel of John is a very selective account of Jesus' life. It is not a comprehensive view of His life; a very selective view. Now John is one of four gospels: Matthew, Mark, Luke, John. And I often get the question, "Why are there four gospels? Why isn't there just one composite gospel? Do they differ? Do they contradict?" Well, the answer is yes, they differ, but no, they do not contradict. You have simply four different viewpoints of one person's life. That's all. And they don't contradict. Here's what it's like: the character of Jesus Christ is so unique and so magnificent that like a diamond, you can't just look at it from one angle. You've got to turn it and examine every facet. And so Matthew does it; then Mark does it; then Luke does it and finally John does it.

This is what it is. The Gospel of Matthew was written by a Jew for a Jewish audience to show them that Jesus fulfilled the Old Testament promise that Jesus is the Messiah—the King of Israel. So the message of Matthew is: Behold your King. Mark is different. Mark shows that Jesus is the Servant Prophet. That's why Mark has no genealogy, because servants have no genealogy that matters; they're servants. So the Gospel of Matthew presents Jesus as behold your Servant. Luke includes a lengthy genealogy and he describes Jesus as human. He's the Son of Man. He is fully man; He is fully Man among men. And so Luke presents Jesus as behold the Man. Now you come to the Gospel of John and it's completely different in the way the first three gospels, called the Synoptic Gospels, because they're similar, are written. In John, the heavens open and descends toward us the Son of God, God in human flesh. And if Matthew is saying behold your King, and Mark is saying behold the Servant and Luke is saying behold the Man, then John is saying behold your God. That's how John presents Him in His pre-existence, in His glory, and in His deity. That Jesus Christ is none other than God in human flesh. That's why John doesn't begin with human genetics, but rather, "In the beginning was the Word and the Word was with God and the Word was God." So John goes back before time and space and says, "Jesus didn't have a beginning. He was always there. In fact, He's what began everything else that we see." That's John.

So I think that the third century scholar named Origen, from Alexandria, Egypt, was correct when he said, "We don't really have four Gospels. We have one fourfold gospel in Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John." Now before I tell you what John includes, I need to tell you what John doesn't include because we're still on that little phrase, "which are not written in this book," in verse 30. There is no account of the birth of Jesus Christ in Bethlehem in John's Gospel. There is no account of the baptism of John, of Jesus by John the Baptist at the Jordan River in this gospel. There's no account of Jesus being tempted out in the wilderness by the Devil. And it's simple to see why: John is emphasizing the Deity of Christ, not the humanity of Christ, so he leaves that to the other gospels to cover that. John doesn't cover it.

Now John does describe how the Word became flesh, speaking about the birth but from a whole different angle. This is His incarnation as God in human flesh. John doesn't include any of the parables of Jesus like the others do. None of the eschatological discourses does John mention. Eschatology means the study of end times, the Second Coming of Jesus, like Matthew 24 or Luke 13, etcetera. No accounts of Jesus exorcising demons or healing lepers. No formal list of the twelve apostles are found in the Gospel of John. There's no mention of His transfiguration with Moses and Elijah. No record of the formal institution of the Lord's Supper: This is My body, this is My blood. We see Jesus in the upper room, but there's no formal institution of the Lord's Supper and there's no mention of the agony in the Garden of Gethsemane.

Those are in the other three gospels, which are largely informational. This gospel is highly inspirational and applicational. Now look at verse 31 of our text. We've considered what Jesus did, which are not written. Let's see what John documented: "But these are written." What are these? These 879 verses that tell us about the life of Jesus. "These are written that you may believe that Jesus is the Christ, the Son of God, and that believing you may have life in His name." Now just as John is unique in what he leaves out, let me tell you how unique he is in what he puts in. Ninety percent of the material in the Gospel of John—nine-zero, 90 percent—is all new material. You would never know about these things unless they were in John's Gospel. So 90 percent of the material in John is not found in any of the other synoptic gospels.

Matthew, Mark, and Luke follow the same chronology, the same pattern, the same content. John gives 90 percent new stuff; new information. For example, the opening prologue is all new. "In the beginning was the Word, the Word was with God, the Word was God. He was in the beginning with God. All things were made through Him, without Him nothing was made that was made. In Him was life, and the life was the light of men. And the light shined in darkness, and the darkness comprehended it not, and the Word became flesh." On and on, that whole beautiful prologue that speaks of Jesus' exultation, incarnation, and deity. It's found only in John and nowhere else.

The first miracle at Cana is found in John. That lengthy dialogue with Nicodemus on what it is to be born again is found only in John chapter three. The conversation with the woman at the well of Samaria in chapter four, found only in John. And here's what's really great, you'll notice. Seven times there are statements called the "I AM" claims of Jesus that are found in John. "I am the Bread of Life, I am the Living Water, I am the Way, the Truth, and the Life, I am the Good Shepherd," are found here and here only. The raising of Lazarus from the dead in chapter 11 is found here and only here. The washing of the disciples' feet in chapter 13 is found only here. The upper room discourse, a long teaching, an intimate teaching of Jesus to His disciples in chapter 13, 14, 15, 16—only here. And that great prayer of Jesus, called the high priestly prayer of Jesus, of all of chapter 17, is only found here.

What's more is John includes Jesus' teaching on the Holy Spirit more than all of the other three gospels. He lays an emphasis on that. Something else that's astonishing: John will indicate that Jesus' ministry on earth lasts 3 ½ years. That's well over 1,200 days. But what you may not know is John only focuses on 20 of those over 1,200 days. A very narrow slice of the activities of Jesus Christ. Twenty days out of over 1,200. In fact, John omits the events of the entire second year of Jesus' ministry—they're not even included in his book. So we have a sampling. We have a sampling of some of the words, and some of the events, but that's the whole point. That's the whole point John is making: "Hey, Jesus did a lot of stuff. I didn't write about that. What I did write, I wrote for a purpose and here is the purpose." John's Gospel will promote faith, belief, and that faith will provide life. John's Gospel will promote faith and that faith will provide life.

So notice what it says: "That you may believe that Jesus is the Christ the Son of God." Please understand once again that the purpose of John's writing of this book is not to give us a historical narrative or lots of just, information. This is not a curricula; a written-for-college courses on the Bible as Literature. Or comparative religion. He has an agenda in what he includes. These 879 verses have one purpose: believe. Believe. John will use that word, believe, 98 times. Believe what? Well, it says, "believe that Jesus is the Christ the Son of God," But notice the word "is," if you don't mind. "That Jesus is." And so, I'm going to sum it up by saying this is what he wants us to believe: that He is among us. He is among us. When did John write this? He wrote it after Jesus died and rose. So he didn't say, "I want you to believe that Jesus was the Christ," past tense, and "was the Son of God." I want you to believe that He is. Because if He died, and He did, and if He rose, and He did, then guess what? He's still hanging around. He is among us. He is alive. That's what John wants us to believe.

And I believe, in fact I know, that your faith will be increased in this series. For some, faith will be birthed during this series. I can't wait to see what's going to happen in terms of people coming to Christ, and people's faith being restored and renewed. It's going to happen. It's going to happen. It says it's going to happen. William Barkley wrote these words: "So often we have a kind of vague, wistful longing that the promises of Jesus should be true. But the only way to enter into them is to believe in them with a clutching intensity of a drowning man." Now you're going to find in the gospel that sometimes people will be face-to-face with Jesus and they'll be at the end of their rope and when it says, "They believe," it's with this kind of faith. Not like, "Ok, well that's cool, Jesus, I'll be in church next week." No. It's like, "I believe," with a clutching intensity of a drowning man.

Notice something else in verse 31: "Not only that you may believe that Jesus is the Christ the Son of God," but notice this: "That believing," here's a better translation, "That as believers." It's put in a special tense, the present active subjunctive—it's in the continual tense. It's not speaking about, "Hey, I'm writing this stuff just for evangelism's sake. So that people will get saved. But now that you are saved and now that you do believe, that continuing to believe you will have life in His name." I wonder how many believers enjoy life in His name. Enjoy believing. I know a lot of Christians, they say they believe but, boy, you wonder what difference faith has made. When my son Nate was just a little guy and I used to throw him up in the air, that was just last year, no, this was years ago. I'd throw him up in the air. Now I'm 6'5 and one of the first, one of the greatest things he loved whenever I'd see him afternoons was to toss him up in the air. Remember doing that, dads or moms? Well, I'm 6'5 and I can throw him up pretty high so he could get about, you know, he could be up in the stratosphere sometimes. Way up there. Well, he loved it. "Do it again, Daddy, do it again!" I throw him up. "Don't stop, Daddy, do it again!" He loved it. I kept doing it. I remember doing that, I think it was here on the campus and somebody saw me and got very nervous and walked up to me and said, "I wouldn't do that. That's dangerous." They were all nervous. You could see it in their face. And I said, "Just do me a favor. Watch the next time I do it right here in front of you and watch his face and tell me what that face says to you. Ready? Watch, here it goes! Here it goes! Look at him right now. What's he saying?" He's going, "Yeahhh..." And here's why: he trusted me. I'd never dropped him. No, I did once—no, I didn't. I'm just kidding. I never dropped him. And that's why it was such a joy to him. Because I didn't drop him. He trusted. And he'd do it again, do it again.

Your life and my life are going to take some interesting twists and turns through this study of the Gospel of John and sometimes you're going to feel like you're just kind of floating out there in space, but you might just find yourself being caught by Jesus and you might just be saying, "Do it again! This life of faith is great. Do it again—I'm enjoying life in Your Name. Do it again!" That you may believe in that, as a believer, continuing to believe, you might have life in His name. Now notice the word Christ in verse 31. That's a title, not a name: "That Jesus is the Christ." It bursts some people's bubbles when they discover Christ is not His last name. There's a Christ family living on Branom Lane in Nazareth and Jesus was one of the boys. No. Christ is a title: Christos means "the Anointed One." In Hebrew, Mashiach. If you were to live in Nazareth, Jesus' name was Yeshua. That's what everybody called Him; that's Yeshua. Jesus. And the disciples came to believe that this Yeshua was Yeshua Ha Meshiach. Jesus the Messiah. The Christ. The Promised One that the Old Testament said would come.

Not only that, but John wants you to believe that Jesus is the Son of God. A title John mentions ten times in the book. Now understand what Son of God means. And we'll get into it more later and dissect it. Son of God is a title for deity. That He is the unique Son of God. He's not the Son of God like you and I are sons and daughters of God by faith. This is the unique Son of God that He shares the same nature as the Father. The Father and the Son share the same nature. Jesus will say, "If you've seen Me you have seen the Father." Thus He is the Son of God.

Finally, not only is this John's Gospel and not only will it promote faith, but the faith will produce life. "That by believing you may have life in His name." Now you're going to meet some people in this book and this is what it says, "And Nathaniel believed," chapter one. Chapter two, "And the disciples believed." Chapter four, "The Samaritans believed in Him." "The nobleman believed." And you're going to read all these people that believe and you'll read how they enjoyed the life that came through faith.

So we have 879 verses in this book that will promote faith and that faith will produce life. This is what I want to say as I bring it to a close. When you hear the word "life," here's the problem. See, in English, we have a limited amount of words to describe experiences. So we call one word that could mean something different by just one word. "Life." But the Bible uses three different Greek words, all translated "life," in our English Bible. So here's one: bios. B-I-O-S. Bios, we would say. That's biological life; that's physical life. That's all life on the externals. We get the term biology, biography, from the word bios. Now this kind of word, biological life, is used in the Bible, but very, very seldom. And when it is used, it is used negatively, not positively. John, in 1 John chapter 2 will speak of the lust of the flesh, the lust of the eyes, and the pride of life. Bios—biological life. It's what everybody in the world focuses on. Jesus will even use the term, "The seed that fell among the thorns was choked up by the pleasures of this life." You know, a poll was done a few years ago. Simple question. They asked Americans, "If you could change one thing about your life, what would it be?" Overwhelming answer: my appearance. My appearance. Not my personality, not my spiritual life—my appearance. My body type, my hair color. Of course, that's pretty easy. A couple bucks and you can do that, but it was all external.

Here's the second term the New Testament uses. Not bios, here it is: psuché. It's often translated: life. We get the word psychology from it, or psychologist, or psychiatry. It's the thought life. It's the inner life. It is your personality. But did you know that you can have biological life and psychological life and still be dead? Spiritually. The Bible says that. Or to put it in the words of Princess Bride, "You can be mostly dead." So you've got life, you can breathe, I can breathe, watch me, I can run, I can eat, I'm living, I have life. That's physical, biological life. And you can have a thought life and a pretty intense thought life and a spiritual thought life. But you can still be dead if you lack this kind of life and this third word is the Greek word zóé. It is often accompanied with another word, everlasting or eternal life. And this is the kind of life that is really more of a quality of life than it is a quantity of life. When you think of everlasting life, you might think of just living forever and ever. But technically, everybody has eternal life in that sense. Everybody's going to live forever. It just kind of all depends on where you're going to live forever. And that will determine the quality of life now and then. The Bible speaks of zóé, eternal life.

Henry David Thoreau once said, "Most men lead lives of quiet desperation." I've observed that. I've observed that. Even Ted Turner, the media mogul, said, "Life is nothing but a B-grade movie." Well, let me tell you. That is not what Jesus wants for us. He doesn't want us to settle into just, mediocrity. Jesus said, and you'll read it in John 10, "I have come that they might have life and life more abundantly." Life more abundantly. Or as the Wuest translation says, "Life in super abundance." The Amplified Bible puts it, "Life to the full until it overflows." Do you want that? Boy, I do. Now let me ask you this, how many people do you really know, can you even count them on one hand, that live that kind of life? That live life to the brim? What the French call, "joie de vie," that love for life; and it's because of what Jesus has done and is doing and they have believed and they continue to believe and that is seen by the life that is in them. It doesn't matter what goes on around them—there's life in them.

Well, we're going to meet Jesus face-to-face for a long period of time in this new series and we're going to let His life spill over into our lives. I want to close with something I had read years ago and I dug it out for today. It just seemed to fit in this first study of Believe: 879. It's called "One Solitary Life" by James Hefley. He writes:

"Here is a Man who was born in an obscure village. The Child of a peasant woman. He grew up in another village. He worked in a carpenter shop until He was 30. And then for three years, He was an itinerant preacher. He never owned a home; He never wrote a book. He never held an office. He never had a family. He never went to college. He never put His foot inside of a big city. He never travelled 200 miles from the place He was born. He never did one of the things that usually accompany greatness. He had no credentials but Himself. While still a young man, the tide of popular opinion turned against Him. His friends ran away; one of them denied Him. He was turned over to His enemies. He went through the mockery of a trial. He was nailed upon a cross between two thieves. While He was dying, His executioners gambled for the only piece of property He had on earth—His coat. When He was dead, He was laid in a borrowed grave through the pity of a friend. Nineteen long centuries have come and gone, and today He is the centerpiece of the human race and the leader of the column of progress. I am far within the mark when I say that all the armies that ever marched, all the navies that were ever built, all the parliaments that ever sat, and all the kings that ever reigned put together have not affected the life of man upon this earth as powerfully as has that one solitary Life."

And we will be looking at, as it where, into the eyes of, and gazing at, that one solitary Life: the Lord Jesus Christ. And that Life will impact our life. Let's pray.

Lord, we're excited. We're excited at the things that are written in this book because the things that, by Your Spirit, John included are the kind of things, the kind of truths that spark faith, trust, and it's the kind of trust that produces life, it's the kind of life that is enjoyed no matter what storms are going on around us. There's such life in us that even though we're tossed in the air, You catch us every time. Thank you for that. In Jesus' Name, amen.