John 5.18-47

John 5:18-47 centers on Jesus's claim to be equal with God, sparking conflict with the Jewish leaders. Jesus had just healed a man who had been sick for 38 years on the Sabbath, provoking accusations of breaking the Sabbath law. Jesus defended His actions, declaring that He does what He sees the Father doing, asserting His shared divine nature and authority. He further emphasizes His oneness with the Father, stating that the Father's work is also His own.
These declarations lead to attempts by the Jews to kill Him because of what they assert to be His blasphemy—claiming equality with God. Jesus then identifies His own judgment (based on His divine authority) with the judgment of the Father. He explains that believing in Him means having eternal life, while rejecting Him means facing condemnation because of refusing the One sent by God. By highlighting the witness of John the Baptist, the Scriptures, and the works He performs, Jesus points to His own identity as the Son of God and the promised Messiah. Ultimately, from this passage we see the eternal truth of the consequences that come from either accepting or rejecting Him.

Further notes:

• According to verse 18, to the Jews, calling God your own Father made one equal with God.
• Jesus replied that He is only doing what He has seen His Father doing.
• This was the intent of the Father showing His Son all these things – and He will continue to show Him greater things so that the world will marvel at them.
• Jesus said that He will even give life, because this is also something that the Father has dominion over.
• Furthermore, there is an association (to judgment) with the "life-giving" that Jesus will do, because He links the statement about His ability to give life, with the fact that the Father does not judge anyone but has given all judgment to the Son.
• And more, this is so that those over whom He has the authority of life and death will honor Him (the Son) even as they honor the Father, because barring that they honor the Son, they do not honor the Father Who sent Him.
• Verse 24 necessitates recognizing Christ's oneness with the Father, since Christ declares that: A) eternal life results from 1) hearing (implying obedience) and 2) believing in the Father, who sent Him; and B) such individuals avoid judgment (the Son's domain), thus passing from death to life, escaping condemnation and receiving eternal life from both the Father and the Son.
• Now, those who are dead (condemned according to the preceding verses) will hear Christ’s Words and be redeemed (live).
• This, again, is the authority Christ has, which has been given to Him from the Father.
• Just as the Father gave His Son the authority to judge, so He gave Him the authority to grant life. One cannot go without the other because the authority to grant life also includes the authority to withhold the granting of the same. Therefore, Christ must have the authority to judge.
• Christ makes the connection between life and death in righteousness and hearing His Words to the physical death of those who have already been in the grave. Those, too, will be judged by Christ and pass into the same life/death, eternal life/eternal judgment, as those who are alive and remain, (ref. 1 Thes. 4:17).
• Even the judgment that Christ delivers, however, is subject to the necessity to have two witnesses, and Christ validates His authority to judge, declaring that He can do nothing from Himself, establishing the Father as the second witness, Whose will He is doing (vv32,37).
• Jesus states that the people will presume John the Baptist to be His witness, and indeed, he has borne witness to the truth of Christ as the Messiah, but in this, Christ asserts that the witness He receives is not from man, because Christ is saying these things so that the hearer may be saved. John was a light that they were happy to receive, but they rejected the greater light of Christ, Who is One with His Father.
• Those who think themselves righteous because they have searched the Scriptures think they have eternal life, but they have missed the whole point. These same Scriptures bear witness to Christ, to Whom they are unwilling to come, from Whom they are unwilling to receive life.
• But Christ does not receive glory from men. Nonetheless, men will readily receive glory from each other and believe each other without believing the truth of God that has come to them now in Christ (Mt 24:5). Christ will have no need to condemn them, for they are already condemned in the law they claim to know so well – the law of Moses. But Christ declares that their assertion to know the law of Moses, too, is false, because if they believed Moses, they would believe His Words also.