Trans World Radio - India

Chapter 1

There are 3 great building blocks of the prologue, and the other verses are the cement that holds them together. In each building block there are three great statements:

THE WORD (v. 1) Identification
(3 statements)
THE WORD (v. 14) Explanation
(3 statements)
THE WORD (v. 18) Declaration
(3 statements)

The contrast between Jesus and John the Baptist is sharp. Their relationship is set forth in the contrast:

Chapter 2

Jesus came from heaven’s glory, yet He walks over a hill to Cana to attend a wedding. (He would like to come to your wedding also, and bless it.) Here He performs His first miracle (v. 11) and manifests His glory so that His disciples believe on Him.

Chapter 3

Nicodemus was probably sent by the Sanhedrin to align Jesus on their side, but he found Jesus to be concerned with him personally.

Jesus said, “You must be born again, and therefore the Son of man must be lifted up” (see vv. 7, 14). The necessity of being born again makes imperative the lifting up of Christ on the cross. Jesus did not mean a second beginning, as Nicodemus interpreted it, but a different beginning — being born anew (2 Corinthians 5:17).

Chapter 4

Samaritans were despised by the Jews because they were the result of intermarriage of the poorest class of Jews with the hated Assyrian conquerors. This woman is not only a Samaritan, she is dissolute, rude, and stupid. That the God of eternity would stop to have an interview with her ought to tell us something about God! Notice how gently He deals with her, appealing first to her sympathy and then to her curiosity. The period known as His great Galilean ministry begins with verse 46, dated December A.D. 27. The miracle (v. 50) is not so much the healing of the boy, but it is the faith of the father. Most of us would have said, “When I get home and see my boy running around, then I’ll believe.”

Chapter 5

The last of verse 3 and all of verse 4 is omitted in the best manuscripts. It has been inserted in the King James Version to let us know why that crowd of sick people were there. Today many folk are waiting for some mysterious moving. Notice Jesus did not offer to put him in the water, but said, “Get up. Pick up your mat. Walk!” (see v. 8). Because this was done on the Sabbath, it occasioned the final break with the religious rulers (v. 16). They understood perfectly that He was making Himself equal with God (v. 18).

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