Prologue (1:1 – 14)
The pre-existent Word of God (1:1 – 5)
The forerunner sent from God (1:6 – 8)
The Word made flesh (1:9 – 14)
The witness of John the Baptist (1:15 – 36)
Christ’s infinite qualities (1:15 – 18)
The desperate need of the times (1:19 – 25)
The two baptisms (1:26 – 28)
A new life secured (1:29 – 36)
The first disciples called by Christ (1:37 – 51)
The call of Andrew and John (1:37 – 39)
The amazing surprise (1:37)
The essential motive (1:38)
The evidence of faith (1:39)
The call of Simon Peter (1:40 – 42)
The new name (1:42)
The call of Philip (1:43 – 44)
The call of Nathaniel (1:45 – 51)
Light on the word (1:45)
The promise of greater things (1:50 – 51)
The beginning of miracles (2:1 – 11)
The message of the miracle (2:1 – 2)
The insurmountable problem (2:3 – 5)
The necessity of obedience (2:6 – 8)
The quality of the miracle (2:9 – 11)
Christ purges his temple (2:12 – 25)
Christ’s purity (2:12 – 17)
Christ’s power (2:18)
Christ’s foresight (2:19 – 22)
Christ’s perception of all hearts (2:23 – 25)
The Lord’s agenda (3:1 – 12)
A new life is essential (3:1 – 5)
It is an act of the Spirit (3:6 – 9)
It has been revealed over centuries (3:10 – 12)
Christ’s own appeal to souls (3:13 – 21)
Salvation has always been to individuals by faith (3:13 – 14)
The immeasurable love of God (3:15 – 16)
The condemnation from which we are saved (3:17 – 18)
Why people refuse to believe (3:19 – 20)
The exhortation of Christ to Nicodemus (3:21)
The forerunner bows to Christ (3:22 – 36)
Baptisms of Christ and of John (3:22 – 24)
John’s exemplary spirit (3:25 – 36)
Leaving Judea for Galilee (4:1 – 3)
The woman at the well (4:4 – 26)
A necessary encounter (4:4 – 5)
The Lord’s exhaustion (4:6)
The reluctant hearer (4:7 – 20)
True Worship (4:21 – 26)
Sowers and Reapers (4:27 – 54)
The woman’s testimony (4:27 – 30)
The believer’s great reward (4:31 – 38)
The fruit of witness (4:39 – 42)
A father taught to exercise faith (4:43 – 54)
The house of mercy (5:1 – 15)
A hopeless case (5:1 – 5)
The startling question (5:6 – 7)
The divine initiative (5:8)
The hostility begins (5:9 – 16)
Christ’s second Jerusalem discourse (5:17 – 47)
Christ’s revelation of himself (5:17 – 21)
Honouring the Son (5:22 – 23)
Christ announces the Gospel Age (5:24 – 26)
Resurrection and judgment belong to the Son (5:27 – 30)
Witnesses to Christ (5:31 – 37)
Prejudice and unbelief (5:38 – 47)
The testing of faith (6:1 – 15)
The carnal following of Christ (6:1 – 4)
The proving of faith (6:5 – 9)
The sign of salvation (6:10 – 15)
Earthly or heavenly salvation (6:22 – 37)
Looking for earthly salvation (6:22 – 35)
The preparation of the heart for conversion (6:36 – 37)
Christ reveals Calvary (6:40 – 59)
The drawing of God (6:40 – 47)
The necessity of the ingesting of life (6:48 – 55)
Union with God (6:56 – 59)
Responses to the word of life (6:60 – 71)
The great falling away (6:60 – 67)
The stability of the saints (6:68 – 71)
Reactions to Christ on earth (7:1 – 27)
The reaction of his brothers (7:2 – 10)
The reaction of the leaders (7:11 – 17)
The reaction of the people (7:18 – 27)
The three fold delusion of Christ-less religion (7:28 – 53)
They thought they were joined to God (7:28)
They thought they had power to vanquish Christ (7:29 – 41)
They thought they had knowledge (7:42 – 53)
The divine wisdom and grace of Christ (8:1 – 12)
The composure of Christ (8:1 – 2)
The inescapable trap (8:3 – 5)
The Lord’s total command of the situation (8:6 – 12)
Grades of Belief (8:13 – 42)
The rejection of the person of Christ (8:13 – 20)
The warning of Christ (8:21 – 42)
Christ the key to knowledge (8:43 – 59)
Without him, nothing makes sense (8:43 – 54)
Christ’s centrality (8:55 – 59)
Seeing Christ at work (9:1 – 41)
The initiative of God in salvation (9:1 – 2)
A demonstration of Christ’s power and love (9:3)
Christ’s commission to us (9:4 – 5)
Christ’s gift of sight (9:6 – 14)
Christ’s new priesthood (9:15 – 41)
The new Messianic order (10:1 – 21)
Learning Christ’s methods (10:22 – 41)
Always engaged in outreach (10:23)
Messengers of realism (10:23)
There is no spiritual light for the unwilling (10:24)
The doctrine of the perseverance of the saints (10:28 – 42)
The resurrection and the life (11:1 – 46)
Christ’s first intimation – for the glory of God (11:1 – 10)
The second intimation – awakened from sleep (11:11 – 13)
The third intimation – Lazarus is dead; let us go to him (11:14 – 22)
The fourth intimation – your brother shall rise (11:24 – 46)
God’s superior power (11:47 – 57)
Their predictions were wrong (11:47 – 48)
Their objective was wrong (11:49 – 57)
The Momentous Supper (12:1 – 7)
Seven views of Messiah (12:12 – 30)
The voice of the people (12:12 – 13)
The voice of prophecy (12:14 – 16)
The voice of witnesses (12:17 – 18)
The voice of opponents (12:19)
The voice of the Gentiles (12:20 – 22)
The voice of Christ (12:23 – 27)
The voice of God the Father (12:28 – 30)
Christ’s final public message (12:31 – 50)
The judgment of this world (12:31 – 33)
The scornful question (12:34)
Christ’s last message (12:35 – 36)
The tragic hardening (12:37 – 50)
Washing the disciples’ feet (13:1 – 17)
A symbol of Christ’s love (13:1)
A symbol of Christ’s humiliation (13:2 – 4)
A symbol of cleansing (13:5 – 11)
A symbol of humility (13:12 – 17)
Seeing things unseen (13:18 – 35)
The Lord reads the heart (13:18 – 19)
Their noble office (13:20)
The depth of hypocrisy (13:21)
The need for heart searching (13:22)
Christ directs all (13:23 – 30)
The humiliation that leads to glory (13:31 – 32)
The coming new community – the New Testament church (13:33 – 35)
The imperfect understanding of the disciples (13:36 – 38)
How Christ builds our faith (14:1 – )
The absolute necessity of faith (14:1)
Christ’s heavenly objective (14:2 – 5)
Christ fulfils the sacrifices (14:6)
Christ’s true divinity (14:7 – 11)
The disciples commissioned (14:12 – 14)
How Christ tells of the Spirit (14:15 – 22)
A blessing exclusively for believers (14:15)
The person of the Holy Spirit (14:16)
He is the illuminator of human hearts (14:17)
He is the assurer of God’s people (14:18 – 20)
Christ’s promise to his people (14:21 – 22)
Lessons in love (14:23 – 31)
Love learns (14:23 – 26)
Love trusts (14:27)
Love identifies with his cause (14:28 – 29)
Love gives (14:30)
Love obeys (14:31)
The Lord’s parable of the vine (15:1 – 11)
The source of fruit (15:1 – 3)
The perpetuation of fruit (15:4 – 6)
The means of obtaining fruit (15:7 – 11)
Chosen for service (15:12 – 16)
The mutual love that is commanded (15:12)
Their inconceivable privilege (15:13 – 15)
Our significance and authority (15:16-17)
The church and the world (15:18 – 27)
The world’s hatred for Christ and his church (15:18 – 19)
Persecution of the church (15:20 – 21)
Hatred without cause (15:21 – 25)
The witness of the Spirit (15:26)
The witness of the church (15:27)
The era of the Spirit (16:1 – 11)
The bleak side of the matter (16:1 – 7)
He will convict of sin (16:8 – 9)
He will convince of righteousness (16:10)
He will convince of judgment to come (16:11)
Christ’s last four promises to his disciples (16:12 – 33)
The promise of knowledge (16:12 – 15)
The promise that Christ will be ‘seen’ by them (16:16 – 22)
The promise of access to the Father (16:23)
The promise of joy (16:24 – 33)
The Lord’s high priestly prayer (17:1 – 26)
Introductory observations (17:1-5)
The characteristics of true believers (17:6 – 21)
They have been given light and understanding (17:6 – 8)
Prayer that his disciples should be kept for his glory (17:9 – 10)
Prayer that his disciples should be kept from the world (17:11 – 16)
Prayer that his disciples should be sanctified (17:17)
Prayer that his disciples should be sent (17:18 – 26)
The trials of Christ (18:1 – 40)
Christ’s betrayal and arrest (18:1 – 9)
Peter’s mistaken violence (18:10 – 11)
Christ is sent to Annas (18:12 – 14)
Peter’s first denial (18:15 – 18)
Christ’s first hearing (18:19 – 25)
Peter’s final denial (18:26 – 27)
Christ before Pilate (18:28 – 40)
Aspects of Calvary (19:1 – 42)
He took our humiliation (19:1 – 5)
He took our unbelief (19:6 – 14)
He took our corruption and rejection (19:15)
He took our shame (19:16 – 18)
The fulfilment of the law and the prophets (19:19 – 37)
Secret disciples transformed (19:38 – 42)
The strategy of resurrection (20:1 – 31)
The resurrection unexpected (20:1 – 2)
The gentle intimation (20:3 – 10)
The initial caution (20:11 – 18)
The proof of the fulfilment of Christ’s mission (20:19 – 25)
A command to trust (20:26 – 31)
Resurrection counsel (21:1 – 25)
Christ is the sole source of blessing (21:1 – 14)
Christ is the only source of personal strength (21:15 – 17)
Glorifying God in life and death (21:18 – 19)
Individual accountability (21:20 – 23)
The inestimable glory of Christ’s life (21:24 – 25)
Bible Commentary on the Gospel of John
by Dr Peter Masters, Metropolitan Tabernacle, London (adapted from sermons)
The Gospel of John is a book so disarmingly simple in language, and yet so spiritual in tone, so profound and substantial in content.
The Gospel is written by the apostle John, one of the three inner circle disciples, the disciple who never mentions himself. It has been said that for a man on earth he would have known Christ better than any other disciple, and that is very likely. He was next to Christ at the Last Supper; he stood at the Cross; he was the first to look into the sepulchre; the first to grasp the resurrection of Christ, and the wonder of it and the amazing nature of it. He died as a very old man in Ephesus, so Christian tradition tells us.
It is clearly the last of the gospels, since it assumes that the reader is familiar with the gospel of Christ, that we know Matthew, Mark, and Luke. It does not repeat many of the things in the other gospels, but speaks as though we are aware of them and know about them. But this is not just a fourth Gospel; it is more than that because it has a very distinctive purpose and a style all of its own. It doesn’t contradict in any way the other three Gospels. It doesn’t attempt to correct them or add to them or anything of that kind. It is not strictly biographical; in fact it is less biographical of Christ and his work than the other three Gospels. The others prove that the prophecies of the Old Testament were fulfilled in the life and ministry of Jesus Christ: John does not attempt to do that. The others among them provide a genealogy for Christ: John does not do that either. There is the Sermon on the Mount: John passes over the Sermon on the Mount, though he was there. There are all those wonderful parables: John doesn’t give us the parables, not that he is contradicting the other Gospels, but this gospel has a different purpose and a different direction, and it names that purpose in several places as the Gospel proceeds. It focuses on the divinity of Christ and on the glory of Christ. John is inspired to write his gospel with a lot of analysis, proving that Jesus was the Christ, plumbing the depths of the gospel message, showing what union with Christ really is. It give special attention to the final instruction which Christ gave privately to his disciples just before Calvary, and devotes five chapters (13 – 17) to this instruction not found in the other gospels.
He is clearly an eyewitness. There are many little things mentioned in the Gospel of John that are not mentioned in the other gospels. The Gospel of John even tells you the time that certain incidents took place. It is clearly by the apostle John, he is clearly an eye witness. Seven whole chapters (13-19) of this gospel are devoted to a period of just twenty four hours and contain instruction of Christ to his disciples not found in any of the other gospels.
We often look at this gospel to find evangelistic doctrines, for John tells us, ‘These are written, that ye might believe that Jesus is the Christ, the Son of God; and that believing ye might have life through his name’ (John 20:31), but the book also contains many exalted views of Christ for the deepening of our faith. This magnificent gospel of our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ is full of vital doctrine and insight, showing staggering concepts of faith, just what we need to realise our privileges in Christ, and to be lifted up almost to the heavens.