John

John calls Jesus’ mighty works signs, and the KJV often renders the word “miracles.” At Cana Jesus “manifested forth his glory; and his disciples believed on him” (2:11), and the healing of the nobleman’s son is “the second miracle” (4:54). Most of the signs open into a discourse: the loaves into the bread of life (6:26–35), the blind man’s eyes into the light of the world (9:5), Lazarus into the resurrection and the life (11:25). They also divide. “How can a man that is a sinner do such miracles?” some of the Pharisees ask, “And there was a division among them” (9:16). After Lazarus the council says, “this man doeth many miracles” (11:47), and takes counsel to put him to death. The book closes its account of the signs with their purpose (20:30–31).

In seven sayings Jesus names himself with “I am”: the bread of life (6:35), the light of the world (8:12), the door (10:9), the good shepherd (10:11), the resurrection and the life (11:25), the way, the truth and the life (14:6), and the true vine (15:1). At other times the words stand alone. “Before Abraham was, I am,” he tells those who claim Abraham (8:58). He does not say that he was, but that he is, in the name God gave Moses at the bush: “I AM THAT I AM” (Exodus 3:14). They take up stones; after “I and my Father are one” they do so again, and say why: “because that thou, being a man, makest thyself God” (10:30–33). When he answers the band in the garden, “I am he,” they go backward and fall (18:6).

The book is a record of witnesses. John the Baptist “came for a witness, to bear witness of the Light” (1:7). Charged with making himself equal with God, Jesus names the witnesses to him: John (5:33), the works the Father gave him to finish (5:36), the Father himself (5:37), and the scriptures, “they are they which testify of me” (5:39). In the upper room he promises that the Comforter “shall testify of me,” and adds, “ye also shall bear witness” (15:26–27). At the cross the writer sets down what he saw of the blood and water: “he that saw it bare record, and his record is true” (19:35). The last chapter ends on the same word: “we know that his testimony is true” (21:24).

At Cana Jesus tells his mother, “mine hour is not yet come” (2:4). Twice no man lays hands on him, for “his hour was not yet come” (7:30; 8:20). When Greeks ask to see him he says, “The hour is come, that the Son of man should be glorified” (12:23), and speaks of the corn of wheat that must die to bring forth fruit. The hour is his death, which he calls being lifted up: “And I, if I be lifted up from the earth, will draw all men unto me,” and John adds, “This he said, signifying what death he should die” (12:32–33). On the last night he prays, “Father, the hour is come; glorify thy Son” (17:1). In John the cross is where the Son is glorified.