Today’s passage continues the conversation we’ve been having with Jesus about who He is, as we’re told through the Bible, God’s Word. So far, we have heard: Jesus is…the Son of God. Jesus is…the Lamb of God. Jesus is…the Teacher. Jesus is…the Messiah. Jesus is…the Temple. Jesus is…the giver of eternal life. Jesus is…the giver of Living Water. Jesus is…the Lord of Creation. Jesus is…the bread of life. Jesus is…from God. Jesus is…the Light of the World.
Today’s passage in John is John 9:16-23. It picks up just after Jesus healed a blind man on the Sabbath by rubbing mud in his eyes. The Pharisees brought the man before them to find out how Jesus had healed the man, no doubt in an effort to try to trap Jesus. Our passage picks up here.
“Therefore some of the Pharisees were saying, “This man is not from God, because He does not keep the Sabbath.” But others were saying, “How can a man who is a sinner perform such signs?” And there was dissension among them. So they said again to the man who was blind, “What do you say about Him, since He opened your eyes?” And he said, “He is a prophet.” The Jews then did not believe it about him, that he had been blind and had received sight, until they called the parents of the very one who had received his sight, and they questioned them, saying, “Is this your son, who you say was born blind? Then how does he now see?” His parents then answered and said, “We know that this is our son, and that he was born blind; but how he now sees, we do not know; or who opened his eyes, we do not know. Ask him; he is of age, he will speak for himself.” His parents said this because they were afraid of the Jews; for the Jews had already reached the decision that if anyone confessed Him to be Christ, he was to be excommunicated from the synagogue. It was for this reason that his parents said, “He is of age; ask him.”
Again, the Pharisees tried to discredit Jesus. Because Jesus healed the blind man on the Sabbath, He surely couldn’t be from God because He did something on the Sabbath.
We’re told that there was dissension among them though. They were arguing with each other, and not all the Pharisees were so quick to discredit Jesus. The Pharisees get a bad rap, and usually for good reason. But the book of John gives us more insight into the full story. Not all the Pharisees were looking to trick Jesus. Not all the Pharisees were trying to prove that He wasn’t the Messiah. We can see this through the story of Nicodemus, who was a Pharisee, yet still seems to have been convinced that the signs Jesus did must mean that God was with Jesus. Nicodemus would later rise to Jesus’ defense to the other Pharisees. John even tells us that Nicodemus was one of the ones who helped prepare Jesus’ body for burial, and that Nicodemus brought the myrrh for Jesus’ body.
In this passage from John we just read, we see that not all the Pharisees agreed that Jesus couldn’t be the Messiah if He healed on the Sabbath. There was dissension among them, they didn’t all agree, and they weren’t all trying to trick Jesus. Some, though not many, may have even believed the truth that Jesus was speaking.
Since they couldn’t agree on their opinion of Jesus, rather Jesus was the Messiah or not, rather He really was from God or not, they asked the man who had just been healed of life-long blindness who he said Jesus was. The man responded simply, “He is a prophet.”
Jesus is a PROPHET.
The idea of prophets has become an idea that can be very confused and confusing. People inside and outside the church call themselves prophets. These self-proclaimed prophets spout off all kinds of interesting ideas about prophecy, and most people don’t know enough about what Biblical prophecy actually is, or who Biblical prophets actually are, to be able to judge what is true and what is not, and who is true, and who is not.
So, what is a true prophet, a Biblical prophet? We need to know, that way, when we hear claims in the church and out of the church of prophets and prophecy, we can handle those claims appropriately.
There are a lot of mentions of prophets throughout the Bible, and even by the time Jesus was ministering, false prophets and false prophecy were a well-established problem. But, we can look at the example of true, Biblical prophets actually sent by God, and the example of Jesus, to see what a prophet actually is.
When we look at the example of Biblical prophets: Jeremiah, Isaiah, Ezekiel, Daniel, Joel, Amos, Jesus, John the Baptist, the apostle John, we see that they were tasked with one main purpose. The main purpose of Biblical prophets was to speak God’s Word to people. They heard whatever God had to say to the people, and they spoke that word.
That came in one of two forms throughout the Bible: either through the prophet proclaiming God’s TRUTH, or the prophet revealing God’s PLANS. Proclaiming God’s truth to the people entailed speaking God’s words to them about something that was happening right then and there. Think of Elijah and the ordeal with the false prophets of Baal. Everything that Elijah said and did was God’s truth to the people in a situation that was unfolding in their present time.
Revealing God’s plans entails speaking God’s words to people about something that is yet to come, some future event. Think of the visions the apostle John had that he wrote down in the book of Revelation. Everything that John wrote down was revealing God’s plans about many things that had not yet happened, some that still have not happened.
But, whether it’s through proclaiming God’s truth to current situations, or revealing God’s plans about the future, the main purpose of a prophet is to speak God’s Word to the people. And since they are tasked with this high purpose, true prophets, if they really are from God, the words they speak will be 100% correct, 100% of the time. If they really are from God, speaking His Words, everything that they say will be true, every time. That’s one of the main ways that anyone claiming to be a prophet, or to have a prophecy can be tested. If at any point, any person claiming to be a prophet, or claiming to have been given some prophetic thing, if at any point they are wrong about any prophetic word, they are not from God. Because if they are speaking God’s Word, either to present situations or future, God’s Word will not be wrong.
The main purpose of a prophet is to speak God’s Word to the people, but there was another mark of prophets that was sometimes true. Some prophets, both Old and New Testament did miracles and healed people. Not always, but some did. And when they did, what those miracles and healing did was to really affirm in people’s minds that the person was indeed a prophet charged with the task of speaking God’s Word to them.
So Jesus is a prophet. This was a well-recognized fact about Him, even though the Pharisees and priests gathered were in disagreement about that point. There are multiple places throughout the gospel before Jesus’ death and resurrection where the people He ministered to proclaimed that He is a prophet. Matthew 21:11 gives us an example of this from the day when Jesus entered Jerusalem triumphantly, riding on a donkey, “And the crowds were saying, “This is Jesus the prophet, from Nazareth in Galilee.” (NASB)
Jesus proclaimed this about Himself as well, that He is a prophet, sent from God, with the purpose of speaking God’s Words to people. When He was teaching in His hometown, people were amazed because they knew His family, knew Him growing up, and “Jesus said to them, “A prophet is not dishonored except in his hometown and among his own relatives, and in his own household.” (Mark 6:4, NASB) He was talking about Himself, the prophet, who did not receive the honor He should have received just because they knew Him as a child and knew His family.
We can clearly see that not only did many people proclaim and recognize that Jesus is a prophet, but He proclaimed that Himself, which of course, He had full authority to do because He had been with God since the beginning and is God, and was sent by God!
The man who had been blind and was healed by Jesus, when questioned by the Pharisees and priests, he proclaimed that Jesus is a prophet. We now know that this means that He spoke God’s Word to people. We know this is true. Jesus spoke God’s Word, and through parables and stories, Jesus proclaimed God’s truth. Through His parables He taught about truths of God’s kingdom, God’s truth about how we are to care for one another and for God’s blessings.
He proclaimed God’s truth through His teachings, and if you look at these references, just in the book of John: John 7:16; 8:26; 12:49-50; 14:10, 24; and 17:8; you can see all the different places where Jesus told people that the message He brought, the words He said were not His own, but God’s Words to them. He proclaimed God’s truth about things that were happening right then and there.
He also revealed God’s plans to them about future things. Matthew 17:22-23 records what Jesus said about His own death and resurrection, “And while they were gathering together in Galilee, Jesus said to them, “The Son of Man is going to be handed over to men; and they will kill Him, and He will be raised on the third day.” And they were deeply grieved.” (NASB) He told them before hand that He was going to be killed and resurrected on the third day.
He told the disciples that one of them would betray Him, and He even knew that it was Judas who would do so. You can read what He told them in Matthew 26:20-25.
He also told the disciples that one of them would deny Him, and He knew that it was Peter who would do this. Mark 14:17-20 says this, “And Jesus said to them, “You will all fall away, because it is written: ‘I will strike the shepherd, and the sheep will be scattered.’ But after I am raised, I will go ahead of you to Galilee.” But Peter said to Him, “Even if they all fall away, yet I will not!” And Jesus said to him, “Truly I say to you, that this very night, before a rooster crows twice, you yourself will deny Me three times.” (NASB)
He revealed the sending of the Holy Spirit after He left the earth and ascended into heaven. John 16:7-15 gives us Jesus speaking and telling the disciples that the Spirit would come and would be a counselor to them, that the Spirit would teach them and remind them of all that Jesus had said, and that the Spirit would speak to them the words of God.
In John 16:1-4, and 33, Jesus told them that His followers would be persecuted, condemned, and killed.
Matthew 24:30-31 has Jesus revealing this plan of God’s as well, “And then the sign of the Son of Man will appear in the sky, and then all the tribes of the earth will mourn, and they will see the Son of Man coming on the clouds of the sky with power and great glory. And He will send forth His angels with a great trumpet blast, and they will gather together His elect from the four winds, from one end of the sky to the other.” (NASB) And He revealed to them that one day He would return and take those who belong to Him.
Now, remember the test for true prophets? That if they really are from God, what they say will be 100% correct, 100% of the time? On all of these plans that Jesus revealed, every single one of them has happened, except the last: His own return. But, if He was correct and true about all the ones before that, we have no reason to doubt that the last of God’s plans revealed through Jesus will be correct. In fact, considering that every other piece of predictive prophecy in the Bible has been fulfilled, it’s foolishness to think that this one won’t be.
So, Jesus did the task of speaking God’s Word to people, both by proclaiming God’s truth about circumstances that were happening then, and by revealing God’s plans about the future. He also bore the third mark that sometimes accompanied prophets of the Lord: He did miracles and healings. Just in our passage for this morning, He healed a blind man. He healed multitudes of people, and He did many miracles.
Despite the fact that the Pharisees and priests disagreed with the man who had been blind, that Jesus is a prophet, all of Scripture bears witness to the fact that Jesus is in fact, a prophet. He spoke God’s Word to people by proclaiming His truth about their present events, and through revealing God’s future plans, and He healed people and did many miracles. He is a prophet in every way that marked a true prophet sent by God.
What does this mean for us? One simple fact: we can trust that every word that Jesus said, and every thing that Jesus did was true and real and so anything that He has said regarding the future is true and real. Everything that He said about heaven and salvation, everything He said about a relationship with the Father, everything that He said about the future, we can trust it is true.
1. Given the qualifications for a prophet (proclaiming God’s truth, revealing God’s plans, miracles & healings) that Jesus clearly did, why do you think the Pharisees and priests had such a hard time accepting this truth?
2. Read Acts 3:22-23. Who is the prophet Moses spoke about? What warning does this passage give for those who do not listen to this prophet?
3. Read 1 Corinthians 12:28-29. Are prophets still active in the church? Read 1 Corinthians 14:29-33, 37-40. How should prophets be tested? What should prophetic messages be measured against?