Why Foreign Mission? 16. John’s Christological Mission Theology: Jesus’ Revelation of the Father

Why Foreign Mission?  16. John’s Christological Mission Theology: Jesus’ Revelation of the Father

The first revelation of Jesus in John’s Prologue that I discussed (study 14) had to do with Jesus’ creational revelation of light and life.  The second revelation of Jesus had to do with Jesus’ revelation of grace and truth (study 15).  The third revelation of the Logos in John’s Prologue (Jn. 1.1-18), now presented in this study, is Jesus’ revelation of the Father. 

Jesus’ Mission as Revelation of the Father

Jesus’ revelation of the Father is related to the first two revelations already discussed from the Prologue.  First, his giving of life is a work that draws Jesus’ into the divine identity of the Father:

Very truly, I tell you, anyone who hears my word and believes him who sent me has eternal life, and does not come under judgment, but has passed from death to life.  ²⁵ "Very truly, I tell you, the hour is coming, and is now here, when the dead will hear the voice of the Son of God, and those who hear will live.  ²⁶ For just as the Father has life in himself, so he has granted the Son also to have life in himself… (Jn. 5.24-26).

Second, Jesus’ revelation of God’s character as grace and truth (study 15) and not only as the giver of the Law to Moses is even closer to the point to be made here.  Jesus’ actually works grace and truth in his ministry.

Indeed, Jesus’ mission is to reveal the Father.  From the very beginning of John’s Gospel, Jesus presents himself as Jacob’s ladder that extends into heaven and up which people in the world can see heavenly realities being revealed through his ministry:

And he said to him, "Very truly, I tell you, you will see heaven opened and the angels of God ascending and descending upon the Son of Man" (Jn. 1.51).

Thus anyone who has seen Jesus has seen the Father (Jn. 14.9).

Jesus as the One Who Can Reveal God’s Identity

The first and the last verses of John’s Prologue affirm Jesus’ divine identity, and therefore his ability to reveal the divine identity.  ‘In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and what God was, the Word was’—to draw out the meaning of the Greek in Jn. 1.1.  Also, as we know from Ex. 34, no one has ever seen God, not even Moses, but the monogenēs theos—the ‘only-and-dearly-loved’ God—who is in the bosom of the Father, has made him known (Jn. 1.18). 

The term monogenēs is difficult to translate, but its meaning is clear: it is the term one would use of an only child who is, therefore, a most loved child—both points being brought out in the translation I have offered.  The emphasis does not fall on begetting a child but on ‘only’ and ‘beloved.’[1]  This is the major point that the Prologue in John makes, as can be seen in the intriguing fact that the number of syllables in Jn. 1.1-18 equals the sum of the numerical value of the letters in the word monogenēs—496.[2]  John uses this term monogenēs in reference to Jesus twice in the Prologue (Jn. 1.14 and 18) and twice in ch. 3 (vv. 16 and 18).  Who but the monogenēs is in a position to reveal divine identity so clearly?

Jesus’ Mission of Revelation to the Jews and to the World

John’s Gospel presents the story of God’s revelation of his glory in Jesus Christ to a sinful world.  John sums up his view of the human condition in the word ‘world’ (‘kosmos’).  For John, ‘kosmos’ can mean the created order, with no negative connotations, but the usual meaning is negative in John: the world is where God’s revelation in Jesus is rejected (for both meanings, see 1.10).  God and world are opposites, yet God created the world, loves it, and works to save it (3:16f; 12.46).  The world is also depicted through other Johannine terms: darkness (1.5; 12.46); death (5.19-27; 8.37, 44); sin (8.21, 34); slavery (8.34-36); and falsehood (8.44).  In this understanding of the world John shares the perspective of apocalypticism (Daniel, Zechariah, Is. 24-29): an evil world needs God’s redemptive intervention.[3]

The group designated by John as the ‘Jews,’ like ‘world,’ is typically a negative group.  This is no more anti-Semitic than saying 'the world is sinful' is anti-human.  Both terms are distinguishable from the disciples, who are both Jews and humans from the world.  Moreover, the term ‘Israel’ is positive in John’s Gospel.  Jesus dies as ‘king of Israel’ in John’s Gospel, and he is her ‘Messiah’ (Jn. 1.41, 45), the one who would restore the kingdom to Israel.[4]  However, he avoids being made king (6.15), and yet kingship in some deeper sense is something that Jesus embraces (18.28-19.26). Jesus enters Jerusalem as a kingly figure (12.13), as in the Synoptic Gospels.  In the purpose statement of John’s Gospel, ‘Son of God’ and ‘Messiah’ appear to be equated: ‘But these are written so that you may come to believe that Jesus is the Messiah, the Son of God, and that through believing you may have life in his name’ (Jn. 20.31).[5] 

Yet Jesus’ functioning as ‘Messiah’ for Israel is a story within a story.  The larger story is that Jesus functions as the lamb of God who takes away the sins of the world (Jn. 1.29).  He is the Son whom God gives in love to save or give eternal life to all who believe in him in the world (Jn. 3.15-16).  As the Samaritans testify, he is the ‘Savior of the world’ (Jn. 4.42), and, as Thomas confesses, he is ‘my Lord and my God’ (Jn. 20.28).  Thus, Jesus’ messianic restoration of Israel despite opposition from the Jews is, on a larger scale, a salvation of the world despite its opposition.

John’s Gospel is about God’s redemptive coming to intervene in this world.  He comes by sending his Son to save the world (3.16f).  Jesus is the light of the world (1.5; 8.12), the resurrection and the life (11.25), and the one who has descended from God and ascended to him (3.13; 6.38; 17.13). 

Mission entails God’s self-revelation in Jesus Christ and his salvation in Jesus Christ for a sinful world that he loves (cf. Jn. 3.16).

Revealing God’s Identity in the Cross

John offers a profound interpretation of Jesus’ revelation of the divine glory.[6]  On three occasions, Jesus speaks of his being ‘lifted up,’ which has the double meaning of glorified or exalted and being lifted up on the cross: Jn. 3.14-15 (twice); 8.28; 12.32-34 (twice).  This double meaning is already present in Isaiah, where the servant—whose suffering is described in ch. 53—is first described as exalted and lifted up by God (Is. 52.13). 

The middle of these ‘lifted up’ sayings in John’s Gospel, Jn. 8.28, is also the middle of the seven occasions when Jesus speaks of himself as the ‘I AM.’  In John, Jesus’ use of the absolute ‘I AM’ saying (Jn. 4.26; 6.20; 8.24; 8.28; 8.58; 13.19; 18.5-8 (3 times)) likely alludes to God’s use of ‘I AM’ to reveal himself.  As in John, the Greek Old Testament uses the absolute ‘I AM’ seven times (Dt. 32.39; Is. 41.4; 43.10; plus the double ‘egō eimi, egō eimi in Is. 43.25; 45.18; 46.4; 51.12).[7]

Thus Jesus’ revelation of divine identity, of himself as the ‘I AM,’ and his speaking of his own glorification or exaltation on the cross coincide at Jn. 8.28.  Jesus says,

‘… When you lift up the Son of Man, then you will know that I AM….’ (Jn. 8.28, my translation).

What John is showing by this is that the very identity of God the ‘I AM’ is revealed in Jesus’ death on the cross.  How can this be?  God reveals himself in the cross as the God of ‘grace and truth’ or mercy and faithfulness in his relationship to the world (not only to Israel).  He gives his only-and-dearly-loved Son to die (Jn. 3.16-18), just as Abraham was willing to sacrifice Isaac (Gen. 22).  Just as Abraham’s character was revealed to God in his willingness to do what God told him to do, horrible as it was, God reveals his character in his willingness to do the unthinkable, horrible as it was—to give his only-and-dearly-loved Son.  He sent Jesus to die on a cross to take away the sins of the world.  Thus, when Jesus is lifted up on the cross, he is also exalted and shows forth the glory of God—and that glory is the glory of God in his willingness to suffer the death of his Son to remove the world’s sin.

Conclusion

God’s identity is not one only for Israel.  It is an identity that has profound reverberations throughout his entire creation.  His mercy and faithfulness are not only a matter of maintaining covenant relationships with Israel.  They are his very character, a character of grace and truth.  This gets to the heart of mission as both a revelation and outworking of God's grace and mercy in the cross of Jesus Christ.

Mission is revealing God’s divine identity, which is most profoundly revealed in the only-and-dearly-loved Son’s death on the cross.  To reject the cross is to reject God’s identity, the identity of the ‘I AM’ in Jesus as he dies for the world’s sins.  To receive this Jesus is to receive God.  Jesus’ coming into the world raises the stakes: one can no longer accept a partial understanding of God’s identity—even of his mercy and benevolence[8]--and reject the full revelation that Jesus offers.  One is called upon, as was Thomas, to place one’s fingers in Jesus’ wounds from the cross and declare, ‘My Lord and my God!’ (Jn. 20.28).

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[1] So +Craig Keener, The Gospel of John: A Commentary, Vol. 1 (Peabody, MA: Hendrickson Press, 2003), pp. 410-416.

[2] +Richard Bauckham, The Testimony of the Beloved Disciple: Narrative, History and Theology in the Gospel of John (Grand Rapids, MI: Baker Academic, 2007), pp. 275f, with reference to M. J. J. +Menken, Numerical Literary Techniques in John: The Fourth Evangelist’s Use of Numbers, of Words and Syllables, NovTest.Supp. 55 (Leiden: Brill, 1985).

[3] D. Moody Smith, The Theology of the Gospel of John (New Testament Theology; Cambridge University Press, 1995).

[4] D. Moody Smith, The Theology of the Gospel of John.

[5] ‘Son’ or ‘Son of God’ means more than ‘Messiah,’ of course; it carries a broader range of meaning.  It does not, of course, mean that God had a child.  The term ‘Son’ is used of Jesus relationally, not as a term for an offspring.  It is also a term that conveys a sharing of divine identity with God the Father.

[6] Richard Bauckham makes the following point in The Testimony of the Beloved Disciple, pp. 275f.

[7] In an earlier study, I noted the uses of ‘I AM’ in John that take a predicate—‘I am the way, the truth, and the light,’ for example (Jn. 14.6).  The absolute use of the statement takes no predicate.  It cannot be easily observed in English translations, however, because translators typically alter the statement to something like ‘I am he.’  This rather misses John’s point.

[8] I have discussed this point with respect to Islam in: Rollin G. Grams, ‘Revealing Divine Identity: The Incarnation of the Word in John’s Gospel,’ in Jesus and the Incarnation: Reflection of Christians from Islamic Contexts, ed. David Singh (Eugene, OR: Wipf & Stock, 2011), pp. 47-59.

Why Foreign Missions? 15. John’s Christological Mission Theology: Mission as the Revelation of Grace and Truth through Jesus Christ

Why Foreign Missions?  15. John’s Christological Mission Theology: Mission as the Revelation of Grace and Truth through Jesus Christ

A second way in which the prologue to John’s Gospel presents the revelation of the Logos or Word is as ‘grace and truth.’[1]  These two terms occur together only in the prologue (Jn. 1.14, 17), whereas the rest of John’s Gospel often uses the single word ‘alētheia,’ ‘truth’ (or the related ‘alēthinos,’ ‘true’).  Indeed, truth is a theme worth exploring along with ‘witness’ and related, forensic notions in John’s Gospel, as +Andrew Lincoln has done.[2]  Here, however, the focus will be on Jesus’ revelation of ‘grace and truth’ in comparison with the revelation of Moses.

The Underlying, Old Testament Phrase for ‘Grace and Truth’

The phrase ‘charis kai alētheia,’ ‘grace and truth,’ is found in Jn. 1.14 and 17.  It is John’s translation of the Hebrew phrase ‘hesed we’emeth,’ found 13 times in the Old Testament (Gen. 24.49; 47.29; Ex. 34.6; Josh. 2.14; 2 Sam. 2.6; 15.20; Ps. 25.10; 61.8; 85.11; 86.15; 89.15; Prov. 3.3; 20.28).  This phrase indicates the devotion and commitment within a deep relationship.  God’s character in his covenant relationship with his people is described with these terms: it is a character that is merciful and faithful. 

Truth.  The Greek translation of the Old Testament uses three words to translate ‘emeth.’  First, and most often, ‘alētheia’ or ‘alēthinos’ (‘truth’ or ‘true’/’dependable’) is used for ‘emeth’ in the Greek Old Testament, as in John’s Gospel.  Other terms used include ‘dikaiosunē’ (‘righteousness,’ Gen. 24.49), ‘eirēnē,’ (‘peace,’ Ps. 85.11), and ‘pistis’ (‘faithfulness,’ Prov. 3.3).  In this phrase, the word seems to emphasise a virtue: it is a character term.  This is confirmed when its related phrase is considered.

Grace.  Whereas John uses ‘charis’ (‘grace’) to translate the Hebrew word ‘’hesed,’ the Greek Old Testament most often uses ‘eleos,’ ‘mercy/compassion.’  The related Greek word ‘eleēmosunē,’ ‘kind deed,’ is also used (Gen. 47.29; Prov. 3.3; 20.28), with the emphasis falling on the action a compassionate or merciful person might perform for somebody.  Ps. 86.15 uses another, related term, ‘polueleos,’ ‘abundant mercy.’  Only John renders the Hebrew term ‘’hesed’ with ‘charis’ (‘grace’), but it is an appropriate translation and clearly related to ‘mercy.’  According to +Robin Routledge, the Hebrew term ‘’hesed’ is relational and, in its broadest sense, means doing whatever one needs to do in order to keep a relationship.  He says,

By entering into a covenant with his people, God has bound himself to show hesed to them.  This includes, love, loyalty and faithfulness to his covenant promises.  It includes kindness, mercy and grace that bears with, and remains committed to, his people despite their sin, and provides the basis for forgiveness and restoration. [3]

Thus ‘hesed’ it is a covenantal term, used of God’s covenant relationship with his people.  As such, it also relates to what God does to maintain the covenant relationship with his people.  Hesed is

the means by which [the covenant relationship] continues, even though, because of the people’s unfaithfulness, it might properly be terminated.  It thus provides the basis for restoration and the promise of a new covenant (e.g. Jer. 31:3; Hos. 2:18-20).[4]

The phrase, then, has God’s character in a committed, covenant relationship in mind.  It has to do with God’s character as he relates to his people, Israel.  God relates to Israel, even wayward, sinful Israel, with grace, mercy, kindness and with faithfulness and dependability.

God’s Mercy and Faithfulness at Sinai and in the Word

John contrasts Jesus’ revelation of grace and truth to Moses’ revelation of the Law: ‘The law indeed was given through Moses; grace and truth came through Jesus Christ’ (Jn. 1.17).  As +Richard Bauckham notes, this statement brings Ex. 34 into focus for John’s prologue:[5]

‘God’s gracious love, central to the identity of the God of Israel, now takes the radically new form of a human life in which the divine self-giving happens.’

The incarnation of Jesus is a revelation of the identity of God in a related way to the revelation that Moses received of God on Mt. Sinai.  As God passes by, Moses hears a small voice reveal who YHWH is:

The LORD passed before him, and proclaimed, "The LORD, the LORD, a God merciful and gracious, slow to anger, and abounding in steadfast love and faithfulness,  ⁷ keeping steadfast love for the thousandth generation, forgiving iniquity and transgression and sin, yet by no means clearing the guilty, but visiting the iniquity of the parents upon the children and the children's children, to the third and the fourth generation" (Ex. 34.6-7).

The phrase ‘steadfast love and faithfulness’ in this NRSV translation is the phrase hesed we’emeth’ or, as John might have translated it, ‘charis kai alētheia,’ ‘grace and truth.’  What Moses understood of God’s identity from a voice, the disciples see in the Word that has come into the world: ‘And the Word became flesh and lived among us, and we have seen his glory, the glory as of a father's only son, full of grace and truth’ (Jn. 1.14).

The story of God’s self-revelation in Ex. 34 is the culmination of a profound lesson in divine identity.  Moses first received the Ten Commandments from God even while Israel was breaking the first two commandments at the foot of the mountain.  Moses consequently broke the stones on which the commandments were written.  God then permitted Moses to receive the commandments again, and it is at this point in the narrative that God gives a further revelation of himself to Moses.  He is not only the God of the Ten Commandments, the Law.  He is also the God who is merciful, gracious, slow to anger, and abounding in grace and truth in his relationships even as he holds people accountable for their sins.

The revelation of God’s identity in Ex. 34 goes beyond the covenant relationship he has with Israel.  From John’s perspective, at least, the covenant is not so much the basis for hesed as ‘grace and truth’ are the basis for what God does, and what he does is not merely for his covenant people but also what he does for the world.  God’s ‘grace and truth’ is the basis for mission that includes both Jews and Gentiles.  Those who receive Jesus, whether Jews or Gentiles, are given power to become God’s children:

He was in the world, and the world came into being through him; yet the world did not know him.  ¹¹ He came to what was his own, and his own people did not accept him.  ¹² But to all who received him, who believed in his name, he gave power to become children of God,  ¹³ who were born, not of blood or of the will of the flesh or of the will of man, but of God.  ¹⁴ And the Word became flesh and lived among us, and we have seen his glory, the glory as of a father's only son, full of grace and truth. Thus, whereas hesed we’emeth might be the basis for God’s relationship to his covenant people in the Old Testament, in John ‘grace and truth’ is the identity of God that makes universal mission possible (foreign mission beyond Israel, the covenant people) (Jn. 1.10-14).

Thus, whereas hesed we’emeth might be the basis for God’s relationship to his covenant people in the Old Testament, in John ‘grace and truth’ is the divine identity that makes universal mission possible (foreign mission beyond Israel, the covenant people).  This grace and truth is both revealed and worked in the incarnate Word of God.

Conclusions: Some Missiological Reflections

Several points can be noted for missions from this study.

First, mission can be defined as ‘revealing divine identity,’ making God known.

Second, God makes himself known through his covenant relationship with his people.  This involves both God’s commandments (the Law) and his gracious commitments to his sinful, covenant people (grace and truth).

Third, both dimensions of God’s identity--commandments and grace and truth—were made known to Israel through Moses.  We err when we see Judaism as a works righteousness religion or all about law without seeing in it the grace of God, his commitment to his covenant people.  Yet John sees a deeper revelation of grace and truth in Jesus Christ than what was revealed to Moses.  It is now a revelation in Jesus, the incarnation of grace and truth.  He is the lamb of God who takes away the sins of the world (Jn. 1.29).  He is the one who reveals God’s glory in graciously raising Lazarus from the dead (Jn. 11.4, 40).  He is the one whose hour of death reveals divine glory (Jn. 12.23-28—here both Jesus’ and the Father’s glory are revealed in Jesus’ death), the ‘depth’ of a God who is full of grace and truth.

Fourth, by moving from revelation in law for the people of Israel to revelation of God’s ‘grace and truth,’ divine revelation expands from being a revelation for Israel to being a revelation for all people.  As Jesus says to the Samaritan woman,

Woman, believe me, the hour is coming when you will worship the Father neither on this mountain nor in Jerusalem.  ²² You worship what you do not know; we worship what we know, for salvation is from the Jews.  ²³ But the hour is coming, and is now here, when the true worshipers will worship the Father in spirit and truth, for the Father seeks such as these to worship him.  ²⁴ God is spirit, and those who worship him must worship in spirit and truth." (Jn. 4.21-24, italics mine).

Jesus’ ‘hour’ in John’s Gospel is the hour of his death, and this hour is the hour that worship on Mt. Gerizim for the Samaritans or on Mt. Zion in Jerusalem for the Jews is superseded by worship of Jesus, the new ‘temple’ (Jn. 2.19-22).  Worship of Jesus is a worship in Spirit and truth.

Fifth, this redirecting of worship to Jesus is not a simple replacement of revelation in the Old Testament but a development of it.  There is continuity and development between the ‘old covenant’ and the ‘new covenant.’  This development is more than just a clearer vision of God’s ‘grace and truth.’[6]  It is also a crucial working of God’s grace and truth in the sacrificial death of Jesus on the cross for the sins of the world (Jn. 1.29). 

Sixth, Jesus’ revelation of divine identity, his being ‘grace and truth,’ is a basis for mission to ‘the Jews’ and to ‘the world’ in John’s Gospel.  Universal mission is based in God’s identity as ‘grace and truth,’ revealed in the incarnate Word that has come to Jews and to the world.  Remarkably, this goes beyond God doing whatever he needs to do to maintain covenant relationship with his people, as in the Old Testament.  God’s grace and truth actually redefines God’s people as those who receive Jesus, God’s grace and truth.  Those who receive him are now the children of God.

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[1] The first way considered (in the previous study) was the Logos as light and life.  The third way, to be considered next, is the Logos as a revelation of God the Father.

[2] Andrew Lincoln, Truth on Trial: The Lawsuit Motif in the Fourth Gospel (Grand Rapids, MI: Baker Academic, 2000).

[3] Robin Routledge, Old Testament Theology: A Thematic Approach (Downers Grove, IL: InterVarsity Press, 2008), p. 109.  Routledge gives as an example Ps. 106.45, which relates ‘covenant’ (Hebrew: berith) to hesed.  ‘Here covenant, which God has not forgotten, provides the basis for hesed’ (n. 95).

[4] R. Routledge, Old Testament Theology, p. 109.

[5] Richard Bauckham, God Crucified: Monotheism and Christology in the New Testament (Carlisle: Paternoster, 1998), p. 74.

[6] John’s prologue states, ‘From his fullness we have all received, grace upon grace (Jn. 1.16).  ‘Grace upon grace’ could be understood, as in this translation, as an abundant outpouring of God’s grace.  The phrase ‘grace upon grace’ is a translation of the Greek, ‘charis anti charis,’ which could also be translated as ‘grace instead of grace.’  If this translation were taken with the next verse’s reference to the law being given through Moses but grace and truth being given through Jesus Christ, the idea could be that Moses’ revelation in the Law was a revelation of grace but Jesus’ revelation was even more so.  Is the contrast one of law vs. grace or grace in the law vs. grace in Jesus?  Either way, John sees continuity between Ex. 34 and Jesus’ revelation.

Engaging the Bible in Mission Theology Scholarship: A Multi-Author Book on Bible and Mission

Engaging the Bible in Mission Theology Scholarship: A Multi-Author Book on Bible and Mission

Readers of this blog will likely be interested in a multi-author work by the same title:

Rollin G. Grams, I. Howard Marshall, Peter F. Penner, Robin Routledge, eds., Bible and Mission: A Conversation Between Biblical Studies and Missiology (Neufeld Verlag, 2008).

This publication is the product of a colloquium held at the International Baptist Theological Seminary in Prague that brought together Biblical scholars and missiologists to explore several issues for a Biblical missiology.  The book includes the following authors and articles:

• +Robin Routledge, ‘Mission and Covenant in the Old Testament’
• +Rollin G. Grams, ‘Some Geographical and Intertextual Dimensions of Matthew’s Mission Theology’
• +Peter F. Penner, ‘The Use of the Book of Acts in Mission Theology and Praxis’
• +I. Howard Marshall, ‘Paul’s Mission According to Romans’
• +Corneliu Constantineanu, ‘Reconciliation as a Missiological Category for Social Engagement: A Pauline Perspective from Rom. 12.1-21’
• +David Southall, ‘The Personification of Righteousness within a Metaphoric and Narratorial Setting: A Perspective on the Content of Paul’s Proclamation of the Gospel’
• +Christoph Stenschke, ‘The Status and Calling of Strangers and Exiles: Mission According to First Peter’
• +Scott Hafemann, ‘Missions, the Judgment of God, and the Centrality of Scripture—A Response to David Macdonald Paton from 2 Peter’
• +J. Andrew Kirk, ‘How a Missiologist Uses the Bible'
• +David W. Shenk, ‘The Bible, the Qu’ran and Mission'

Why Foreign Missions? 14. John’s Christological Mission Theology: Jesus as Light and Life

Why Foreign Missions?  14. John’s Christological Mission Theology: Jesus as Light and Life

The previous study noted that John’s theology is a Christ-centred theology.  Thus his mission theology is also a Christological mission theology.  How does this look?  The present study explores the revelation of God in Jesus in John’s Gospel.

In the prologue to his Gospel, John calls Jesus the ‘Word’—God’s revelation.  He is the revelation of God in three ways--creation, grace and truth, and God himself:

(1) Creation: as creator, the one through whom all things came into being, Jesus is the one who gives life and light to all people (1.3);

(2) Grace and Truth: whereas Moses revealed God’s law, grace and truth came through Jesus Christ (1.14);

(3) Seeing God: whereas Moses did not see God, Jesus—God’s only Son and the one close to the Father’s heart--has made God known (1.18).

These themes are developed in the rest of John’s Gospel.  I will look at the first of these, Jesus’ revelation of life and light to all people, in the present study.  The next two will follow.

Mission as the Revelation of Life and Light to All People through Jesus Christ

Jesus is the Source of Life and Light

The Word’s revelation in creation is continued in Jesus’ earthly ministry.  Those who reject Jesus reject his life-giving ministry, and so they will die in their sins (Jn. 8.21, 24).  Yet those who believe in Jesus, even though they die, will live; they will never die because Jesus is the resurrection and the life (Jn. 11.25-26).  Just as Jesus gave life to Lazarus, he gives life to all who follow him (ch. 11).  He gives water that becomes in those who receive him a spring gushing up to eternal life (Jn. 4.14).  The water that gushes from Jesus’ side on the cross is likely symbolic of this water of life that Jesus gives (Jn. 19.34).  There is no alternative source of life, not even the Scriptures.  The Scriptures are rather a witness to Jesus, the source of life (Jn. 5.39-40).  Thus Jesus, the giver of life, was himself raised from the dead.  Or, rather, he who had power to lay down his life and did so willingly also had power to take it up again (Jn. 10.17-18).

Just as sin and death are related (Jn. 8.21, 24), so too sin and darkness are related in John’s Gospel.  Because people’s deeds were evil, they preferred darkness to the light that came into the world (Jn. 3.19).  They feared that their deeds would be exposed (v. 20), whereas people who ‘do what is true come to the light, so that it may be clearly seen that their deeds have been done in God’ (v. 21).  Not much is said about ethics in John’s Gospel, although such verses (Jn. 3.19-21) assume a clear ethic in the Christian community.  John’s point here is worth stressing, since often one hears people say that so-and-so is a good person, just not a believer or perhaps someone who claims to believe but practices a life-style that is opposed in Scripture.  John’s view is that, if a person’s deeds are good, they will be drawn to the light—the light of Christ--rather than reject the light, and so their deeds will be done in God.  Moreover, the ‘commandment’ in John is more than ethics; it is first belief that Jesus is the light that has come into the world and, second, through this belief, to leave the darkness of sin (Jn. 12.46-50).

Jesus’ healing the blind man at the pool of Siloam is indicative of his giving light to the world.  Indeed, he is the light of the world during his earthly ministry (Jn. 9.5).  Part of the metaphor of light in John’s Gospel pertains to Jesus’ coming (as light) into the (dark) world.  This healing at the pool of Siloam illustrates that Jesus was sent into the world as God’s revelation.  Whatever else the symbolism of Jesus’ smearing the man’s eyes with mud might mean, it involves making the man doubly blind.  A blind man with mud on his eyes is a man who cannot see!  The Pharisees, who have double sight--both physical sight and a knowledge of Scripture--are unable to see that Jesus is from God (v. 16).  Their disbelief makes them blind.  Once the doubly blind man washes in the pool of Siloam, which means ‘Sent,’ he is able to see physically and to see that Jesus was the one sent from God.  He declares, ‘If this man were not from God, he could do nothing’ (Jn. 9.33).  The man comes to believe in Jesus, and he worships him (Jn. 9.38).  Jesus responds, ‘I came into this world for judgment so that those who do not see may see, and those who do see may become blind’ (Jn. 9.39).

Mission, then, entails revealing that Jesus is this light and life that has come into the world.

Those Who Believe in Jesus Receive Eternal Life

The only right response to Jesus’ coming into this world is faith.  Believing in Jesus is the way to receive eternal life.  A key text making this point is Jn. 3.15-16:

… that whoever believes in him may have eternal life.  ¹⁶ "For God so loved the world that he gave his only Son, so that everyone who believes in him may not perish but may have eternal life.

Since the opposite of belief is not simply disbelief but disobedience (Jn. 3.36), belief has to do with more than affirming the fact that God sent Jesus into the world.  Belief has to do with obeying the revelation that God has made in Jesus.  Put another way, belief has to do with consuming the ‘bread from heaven,’ which is the revelation that Jesus gives (Jn. 6.27), the one who has the words of eternal life (Jn. 6.68).  Yet Jesus’ revelation in his words is, more profoundly, not different from the revelation of himself.  He is the bread of heaven, and to consume his revelation is to consume ‘the flesh of the Son of Man and drink his blood’ (Jn. 6.53).  Jesus’ revelation from God is, therefore, to be seen most completely and profoundly in the cross.  Believers receive the cross of Jesus as the removal of their sins that they might have eternal life and not walk in the darkness of their sins (Jn. 8.12).  The reason that the author writes this Gospel is so that people will believe that Jesus is the Messiah, the Son of God, and, by believing, they will receive life in his name (Jn. 20.31).

Jesus Has Life in Himself and Will Raise the Dead

Jesus’ revelation of himself as creator during his earthly ministry is seen in his giving life just as the Father raises the dead and gives them life (Jn. 5.21).  Jesus’ claims to divine identity come out clearly in his claim to have the power to give life.  He has the divine authority of the Son of Man (cf. Dn. 713-14) to raise the dead and execute judgment (Jn. 5.24-29).  His authority is exercised not just in the giving of eternal life but in causing the disciples to know the only true God and Jesus Christ whom the Father sent (Jn. 17.2-3).  Indeed, this knowing God and Jesus is eternal life.

Jesus foreshadows this authority in his raising of Lazarus from the dead.  When he does so, Jesus says to Martha, ‘I am the resurrection and the life’ (Jn. 11.25).  Later, he says to his disciples,

 ‘I am the way, and the truth, and the life. No one comes to the Father except through me.  ⁷ If you know me, you will know my Father also. From now on you do know him and have seen him’ (Jn. 14.6-7).

Jesus Lays Down His Life for His Sheep

Jesus’ life-giving power is given, ironically, through death on the cross.  He came to give life (Jn. 10.28), and yet he does so as the shepherd who gives his life for his sheep (Jn. 10.10-11, 15, 18).  The Father reveals his love in sending the Son (Jn. 3.16), and Jesus reveals his love by laying down his life for his friends (Jn. 15.13). The disciples, too, are called upon to give up their lives in the sense of serving and following Jesus (Jn. 12.25-26).  They are the sheep who follow the good shepherd because they know his voice (Jn. 10.3-5).

Christological Mission Theology

A Christ-centred mission theology emphasises that Jesus is the one who gives light and life.  The light and life that Jesus gave at creation are given again in Jesus’ earthly ministry.  He is the light that has come into the world, the revelation from God.  He is the one who gives eternal life to all who believe.  His light draws people out of darkness if they receive him, and he literally gives his own life that others might have abundant and eternal life.  There is no other way to come to the Father but by Jesus (Jn. 14.6).

One should also note that this linking of Jesus’ work in creation and in Jesus’ earthly ministry entails an offer of light and life to Jews and Gentiles alike.  Jews who reject Jesus do not have eternal life but die in their sins (Jn. 8.24).  Greeks come to ‘see’ Jesus, the light (Jn. 12.20).  Thus Jews and non-Jews alike must receive the light and life of Jesus.  Indeed, Jesus is ‘the true light,’ and he came into the world to enlighten everyone (Jn. 1.9).

Jesus’ mission as a mission to every person and every group of people is sometimes seen as intolerance: are there not other ways to God?  Western culture so highly values tolerance that it inevitably hears a Christ-centred mission as an exclusive and negative message.  However, in John’s view, Jesus’ mission of light and life is a demonstration of God’s love for a world in sin.  If one wishes to remain in darkness, in sin, then Jesus’ message will appear as intolerance.  If one claims to have no sin, then Jesus’ offer of life to sinners sounds presumptuous and intolerant.  If one confesses one’s sin and receives Jesus’ death for sin, then Jesus’ light and life will be received as a mission of divine love.

Why Foreign Missions? 13. Presuppositions for a Johannine Mission Theology

Why Foreign Missions?  13. Presuppositions for a Johannine Mission Theology

+David Bosch’s Transforming Mission still stands as a significant work in missiology, even though published in 1991.[1]  Its section on Bible and mission is very good, although it has a number of weaknesses.  It barely addresses the Old Testament.  In the New Testament, it covers Matthew, Luke-Acts, and Paul.  In its examination of these New Testament authors, very little work explores the authors’ use of the Old Testament in mission theology, and this is a major deficiency.  So, as a study in the interface between the Bible and mission theology, Transforming Mission has some significant gaps and weaknesses.  One of these is the omission of a study of John’s profound mission theology. 

The next few studies work towards filling this omission in Bosch.  In this study, John’s theological  presuppositions will be discussed, particularly with respect to his insistence on a Christological theology and the significance of this for mission theology.

Presuppositions for a Johannine Theology

+D. Moody Smith begins his study of John’s theology by highlighting several of John’s presuppositions: God can be known, and he is known through Scripture, Jesus, preaching, the Church, and the Spirit.[2]  If we are to apply these presuppositions to a mission theology, we might note that mission is making God known even as he has revealed himself.  If he has revealed himself in Scripture, then missions begins by knowing and making known the Scriptures.  If he has revealed himself in Jesus, then missions is knowing Jesus and making him known through the Scriptures and by preaching.  If the Spirit continues Jesus’ presence and ministry in the church of Jesus, then missions entails establishing communities of the Spirit where God can be known.

A Christological Johannine Theology: Jesus as God’s Revelation

John focuses God’s revelation and salvation on Jesus, leaving no room for anything else.  Several examples might be given to make this point.  For example, if revelation has come through Moses, it is a revelation that testifies of Jesus.

John 1:17-18 The law indeed was given through Moses; grace and truth came through Jesus Christ.  ¹⁸ No one has ever seen God. It is God the only Son, who is close to the Father's heart, who has made him known.

John 1:45  Philip found Nathanael and said to him, "We have found him about whom Moses in the law and also the prophets wrote, Jesus son of Joseph from Nazareth."

John 3:14-15  And just as Moses lifted up the serpent in the wilderness, so must the Son of Man be lifted up,  ¹⁵ that whoever believes in him may have eternal life.

John 5:45-47  Do not think that I will accuse you before the Father; your accuser is Moses, on whom you have set your hope.  ⁴⁶ If you believed Moses, you would believe me, for he wrote about me.  ⁴⁷ But if you do not believe what he wrote, how will you believe what I say?"

Another example of the focusing of theology on Jesus in John’s Gospel is in relation to the Jewish festivals.  

The feast of tabernacles involved lighting up the court of women with golden lamps (Sukkoth 5).  Jesus refocuses the feast on himself:

John 8:12 Again Jesus spoke to them, saying, "I am the light of the world. Whoever follows me will never walk in darkness but will have the light of life.“

The Passover, too, is given a Christological interpretation.  Jesus says, ‘your ancestors ate manna in the wilderness’ (vv. 31, 49), but now Jesus is the bread from heaven:

John 6:32 Then Jesus said to them, "Very truly, I tell you, it was not Moses who gave you the bread from heaven, but it is my Father who gives you the true bread from heaven.

John 6:33-35   For the bread of God is that which comes down from heaven and gives life to the world."  ³⁴ They said to him, "Sir, give us this bread always."  ³⁵ Jesus said to them, "I am the bread of life. Whoever comes to me will never be hungry, and whoever believes in me will never be thirsty.

John 6:50-51 This is the bread that comes down from heaven, so that one may eat of it and not die.  ⁵¹ I am the living bread that came down from heaven. Whoever eats of this bread will live forever; and the bread that I will give for the life of the world is my flesh."

John 6:58 This is the bread that came down from heaven, not like that which your ancestors ate, and they died. But the one who eats this bread will live forever."

Jesus is the Passover sacrifice, the lamb of God who takes away the sins of the world (Jn. 1.29) by dying at the time that the lambs were slaughtered for Passover (Jn. 19.14-16).

The feast of lights, or Hanukkah, commemorated the rededication of the Temple in the 2^nd century BC after it had been desecrated by the Syrians.  They sacrificed a pig on the altar of the Temple and sacrificed to Zeus, thus committing blasphemy.  Yet, at this feast, Jesus claims to be one with God, and those who hear him accuse him of blasphemy:

John 10:30-31 The Father and I are one."  ³¹ The Jews took up stones again to stone him.

A third example of theology focused upon Jesus in John’s Gospel is the ‘I am’ sayings.  The following quotations present all seven passages in John where Jesus’ ‘I am’ statement has a predicate (the ‘I am’ sayings without a predicate will be discussed in a future study):

John 6:35 Jesus said to them, "I am the bread of life. Whoever comes to me will never be hungry, and whoever believes in me will never be thirsty.

John 8:12 Again Jesus spoke to them, saying, "I am the light of the world. Whoever follows me will never walk in darkness but will have the light of life." (Cf. Jn. 9.5)

John 10:7, 9 So again Jesus said to them, "Very truly, I tell you, I am the gate for the sheep…. ⁹ I am the gate. Whoever enters by me will be saved, and will come in and go out and find pasture.

John 10:11, 14 "I am the good shepherd. The good shepherd lays down his life for the sheep…. ¹⁴ I am the good shepherd. I know my own and my own know me,

John 11:25 Jesus said to her, "I am the resurrection and the life. Those who believe in me, even though they die, will live,

John 14:6 Jesus said to him, "I am the way, and the truth, and the life. No one comes to the Father except through me.

John 15:1 "I am the true vine, and my Father is the vinegrower…. ⁵ I am the vine, you are the branches. Those who abide in me and I in them bear much fruit, because apart from me you can do nothing.

Finally, for our purposes, note that the testimony of the disciples, the testimony of the Holy Spirit, Jesus’  testimony, and the revelation of God in Jesus are all the same: they all concern Jesus.  For example, Jesus says,

"When the Advocate comes, whom I will send to you from the Father, the Spirit of truth who comes from the Father, he will testify on my behalf. 27 You also are to testify because you have been with me from the beginning (Jn. 15.26-27).

Jesus’ testimony is a revelation of the Father such that there is neither any difference nor anything further to reveal.  Jesus’ testimony is the full revelation of the Father.  At the close of Jesus’ public ministry, Jesus makes this very point in a passage that functions as a summary of the previous chapters:

John 12:44-50 Then Jesus cried aloud: "Whoever believes in me believes not in me but in him who sent me.  ⁴⁵ And whoever sees me sees him who sent me.  ⁴⁶ I have come as light into the world, so that everyone who believes in me should not remain in the darkness.  ⁴⁷ I do not judge anyone who hears my words and does not keep them, for I came not to judge the world, but to save the world.  ⁴⁸ The one who rejects me and does not receive my word has a judge; on the last day the word that I have spoken will serve as judge,  ⁴⁹ for I have not spoken on my own, but the Father who sent me has himself given me a commandment about what to say and what to speak.  ⁵⁰ And I know that his commandment is eternal life. What I speak, therefore, I speak just as the Father has told me."

The above examples should suffice to make the point that John is thoroughly Christ-centred.  Johannine theology cannot be divorced from Christology.  Indeed, for John, Jesus is the presupposition for and content of all theology, including mission theology.

Significance for Mission Theology

This Christological focus challenges mission theology today.  It is a concrete rather than an abstract theology, and it is a Christological theology.  Both points are significant for mission theology.

Mission theology is sometimes defined in terms of more abstract categories.  John’s mission theology is relentlessly concrete, focused in Jesus.[3]  Any abstracting of Jesus for the purposes of theology works in precisely the opposite direction of Johannine theology.  To speak of mission theology in terms of ‘incarnation’—admittedly, a Johannine theme—and then to interpret this non-christologically undermines John’s theology.  ‘Incarnation theology’ needs to be Christological through and through.  Or, to transfer John’s Christological theology to a more abstract ‘mission of God’ theology that deemphasises Christ (or the witness of the Church to Christ) is un-Johannine. 

+Jürgen Moltmann has even advocated that we abandon Christology for mission theology.  What we need today, he argues, is a mission ‘theology of the Spirit’ that affirms ‘life’ in every respect.  This involves, in his view, a shift from a Christ-centred missiology that is distinctive from other faith dialogues to a (supposed) ‘Spirit'-centred missiology that focuses on anything promoting ‘life.’  Such a missiology will, he avers, readily and positively engage other faiths.[4]  

John, however, would have none of this, and Jesus’ confrontations with Jews are precisely confrontations having to do with himself.  With John, we have a Christological mission theology.  Just how this looks will be the subject of the next study.

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[1] David J. Bosch, Transforming Mission: Paradigm Shifts in Theology of Mission (Maryknoll, NY: Orbis Press, 1991).

[2] D. Moody Smith, The Theology of the Gospel of John (New Testament Theology; Cambridge University Press, 1995).

[3] I have made this point in several articles, including two that compare John’s theology to Islam on the issues of the cross and the incarnation; cf. Rollin G. Grams, ‘God, the Beneficent--the Merciful, and Jesus’s Cross: From Abstract to Concrete Theologising,’ in Jesus and the Cross: Reflections of Christians from Islamic Contexts, ed. D. Singh (Oxford: Regnum/Paternoster, 2008); ‘Revealing Divine Identity: The Incarnation of the Word in John’s Gospel,’ in Jesus and the Incarnation: Reflection of Christians from Islamic Contexts, ed. David Singh (Eugene, OR: Wipf & Stock, 2011).

[4] J. Moltmann, 'The Mission of the Spirit--The Gospel of Life,' in Mission: An Invitation to God's Future, ed. T. Yates (Calver, Hope Valley, Near Sheffield: Cliff College Pub., 2000), pp. 28f.