Part 3 of this book is an outline of the gospel of John. It is written to demonstrate the links between John's gospel and the Old Testament particularly Moses' writings. Part 3 is dominated by two great themes. One theme is John's water scenes. These are the water scenes of the new birth, corresponding to God's creatorial work over the waters in Gen. 1 The other is a retracing of the story of the desert. John's gospel tells us how Israel got into the desert, how they worshipped God in the tabernacle, and finally left the desert behind for the Promised Land. In summary the water scenes tell us how an individual gets eternal life the desert scenes stress our collective life in the family of God.
John and Moses are in agreement about man. Man was taken from the earth, and must repeat the history of the earth. In his fallen state he becomes like the earth waste and empty, with darkness on the face of the deep. Then just as God began to work from the waters in Gen. 1, so God begins at the water scenes of John's gospel to give man the new birth. "My Father worketh hitherto and I work.”
The presentation of the water scenes in John's gospel is not in chapter order, but moral order. The first water scene is Christ's baptism at the Jordan, where He identifies Himself with the godly in Israel. However this raises the question of man's spiritually dead state. John illustrates this condition with two pools bodies of inert water one featuring an impotent man and another a blind man. They suggest Nicodemus before he received the new birth blind as in 3:3 and impotent as in 3:5. Indeed he will prove to be the pattern man in John's gospel. The pools change their character once man has eternal life. They become rivers of living water figures of service for Christ, and a fountain rising heavenward a figure of worship in the power of the Holy Spirit.
Then John takes up the question of how God can righteously give eternal life to sinners. He answers this with God's salvation, which is both body and soul. Chapters 3:12 and 3:13 are concerned with this question. They mirror the Passover and the Red Sea. It becomes evident that John has begun to retrace Israel's journey from Egypt to Canaan. The next step is the desert, where God enrolls us as students in His house. Chapters 3:14 to 3:17 are about the tabernacle the house of God in the desert, where God teaches us. Chapter 3:18 is concerned with the burnt offering. In Chapter 3:19 we have the crossing of the Jordan. Then the land comes in sight and the land is linked to the temple. Chapter 3:20 depicts certain temple scenes in John's gospel. That gospel begins with Herod's temple and ends with God's temple raised from the dead as Jesus predicted at the beginning of John's gospel. We are in Canaan.
Chapter 3:21 is captioned "the witness of John in the Scripture of truth." This is not a summary chapter. Rather it substantiates John's claim that what he wrote his witness is true. In verifying this claim we discover that the Gospel of John has sunk its roots deep into Scripture as a whole. The gospel of John does not stand alone in the Scripture of truth.