…these are written that you may believe that Jesus is the Christ, the Son of God, and that believing you may have life in His name (John 20:31).
I use GotQuestions.org often. I appreciate that the writers are conservative and that they write clearly and concisely.
I’ve found that when talking about issues related to evangelism and assurance, they tend to present a Lordship Salvation message. While that is sad, there are good articles dealing with other issues.
In an article titled “A Summary of the Book of John,” the author discusses the date and purpose of the book. See here.
He says that John’s Gospel was most likely written between AD 85 and 90. I disagree. I am convinced that it was written early, certainly before AD 70. However, that issue is not as important as the question of the book’s purpose.
When the article’s author discusses the book’s purpose, he correctly identifies John 20:31 as the purpose statement, but then says things that go beyond the purpose specifically stated in that verse.
The article says,
Unlike the Synoptic Gospels, John’s purpose is not to present a chronological narrative of the life of Christ but to display His deity. John sought to strengthen the faith of second-generation believers and bring about faith in others, but he also sought to correct a false teaching that was spreading in the first century. John emphasized Jesus Christ as “the Son of God,” fully God and fully man, contrary to a false doctrine that taught the “Christ-spirit” came upon the human Jesus at His baptism and left Him at the crucifixion (emphases added).
There are four purposes listed there:
- To display Christ’s deity.
- To strengthen the faith of second-generation believers.
- To bring about faith in others.
- To correct false teaching about Jesus Christ.
John 20:31 says nothing about displaying Christ’s deity, strengthening the faith of believers, or correcting false teaching. The only purpose stated in John 20:31 is to lead the unbelieving readers to believe that Jesus is the Christ, the Son of God, so that by believing, they would have everlasting life in His name.
In John’s first epistle, he indicated that his purpose was, indeed, to warn the readers about false teachers (I John 2:18-25), and even specifically stated this as his purpose in I John 2:26: “These things I have written to you concerning those who try to deceive you.” There is no such statement in John’s Gospel.
Since John was writing specifically to unbelievers (“that you may believe…”), his purpose was not to strengthen the faith of those who were already believers.
The expression the Son of God is not a statement of deity in John’s Gospel, as the GotQuestions.org author suggests. It is a Messianic title, as Martha makes clear in John 11:27. After the Lord Jesus said that whoever believes in Him will never die spiritually, He asked Martha if she believed this. She said she did and explained why she believed: “I believe that you are the Christ, the Son of God, who is to come into the world.” The words the Son of God are appositional to the words the Christ. That is, the Son of God is another name for the Christ.
We see the same thing in Nathanael’s statement to Jesus in John 1:49: “Rabbi, You are the Son of God! You are the King of Israel!” There, the expression the King of Israel is appositional to the words the Son of God. Nathanael understood the Son of God to mean the King of Israel.
There is no evidence that Martha, Nathanael, or any of the believers in John’s Gospel believed that Jesus was the second member of the Trinity before His resurrection. No believer is recorded as being persuaded that He was God in the flesh. Yet they did believe and confess that He was the Christ, the Son of God, the King of Israel.
If we misunderstand the purpose of John’s Gospel, then we misinterpret it. If we recognize that the Gospel of John is the only evangelistic book in the Bible, then we go there to determine our view of what one must do to be born again. We should not turn to James, 1 Corinthians, or Hebrews to determine the saving message. Yet many do just that, and then they impose their faulty understanding upon John 3:16 and the scores of faith-alone texts in John’s Gospel.
Keep grace in focus, and you won’t lose sight of the evangelistic purpose of John’s Gospel.
