NOTES for Joh 5:1-24

Gradually the Lord begins to reveal to the disciples—and not only to them—the mystery of His ministry. He came to earth in order to “do” what His Father “does.” Just as the Father gives life to people on the Sabbath, so Jesus gives them life with the Father’s life. He has the right to do this because He is the presence of the Father, the One who carries out His work of judging and giving life. And the evangelist calls us to the breakthrough that he names faith: to see what is not evident, to see behind what happens in our life—whether healing or the sense of divine peace in the heart—the face of Jesus accomplishing the Father’s will and leading us to know the One whom we cannot see by ourselves, but whom we await and honor. Whoever honors the Father must treat the One whom He sent with equal honor and love.