Part of my journey in John 5 this week led me to closely examine the end of the chapter and the implications of non-belief. The words come from Jesus and they must be heeded. Unbelief kills faith, so anything that we can do to rid our lives of it, must be embraced. Here are the words of Christ at the end of John 5.
The Danger of Unbelief
If we do not believe the Father sent Jesus, the words will not abide in Us
John 5:38 and you do not have his word abiding in you, for you do not believe
the one whom he has sent.
We are all in desperate need for the words of God to fill us. It is in the scriptures that we find Christ, so it is only natural that belief in Jesus will move us to establish His word in our lives. A failure to embrace the gift of the Father, Jesus, will keep Jesus only as someone nice, religious etc., but not the one whom we must have all of his words to permeate our whole lives.
If we don’t believe we will love other names
and welcome them more John 5:43 I have come in my Father's name, and you do not receive
me. If another comes in his own name, you will receive him.
Unbelief, according to Jesus here in vs43, will open up our lives to welcome other names, but fail to welcome the name of the Father, will lead us to not receive Jesus. As humans, we are quick to fall in love with the name of the celebrity. From Hollywood, music, sports, and even in the Christian "World", we fall in love with a name. We are though, to welcome one name - Jesus, the gift of the Father.
If we don’t believe we will seek the
glory of others and not God’s glory
John 5:44 How can you believe, when you receive glory from one another and do
not seek the glory that comes from the only God?
Our big issue has always been in our trying to find life being our own god, instead of seeking the glory of God. We are seekers of glory and we struggle with the god of self being exalted higher than Jesus' name. Jesus says that unbelief will reign if we are seeking glory from others.
If we don’t believe the writings, we will
not believe the words of Jesus
John 5:46 For if you believed Moses, you would believe me; for he wrote of me. 47 But if you do not believe his
writings, how will you believe my words?”
Moses loved Jesus though he only saw Him from afar. He fell in love with Jesus in the scriptures and in revelation from the Holy Spirit, Moses wrote about Jesus. The scriptures bear witness of Jesus and if we fail in our understanding of that the Bible is about Jesus, then we will naturally not believe in the words of Christ. The Bible is about Him and it is in the scriptures that our belief in Him will be strengthened.
