What do you think?
Rate this book
21st Century Biblical Commentary
The Gospel of John: Believe and Live (Volume 4)
The message of the book of John is underlined by the use of two key words, believe, used ninety-eight times and life, used thirty-six times. In The Gospel of John, Elmer Towns places a particular emphasis on these words. The Apostle John wrote with a twofold purpose—as noted in 20:31—to communicate Christ through His miracles and teachings so men might, first, believe that Jesus was indeed who He said He was, the Son of God; and second, they might have eternal life because of their belief.
233 pages, Hardcover
First published October 1, 1990
6 people are currently reading
52 people want to read
About the author
Elmer L. Towns
337 books48 followersDr. Elmer Towns is a college and seminary professor, an author of popular and scholarly works (the editor of two encyclopedias), a popular seminar lecturer, and dedicated worker in Sunday school, and has developed over 20 resource packets for leadership education. He began teaching at Midwest Bible College, St. Louis, Missouri, for three years and was not satisfied with his textbooks so he began writing his own (he has published over 100 books listed in the Library of Congress, 7 listed in the Christian Booksellers Best Selling List; several becoming accepted as college textbooks. He is also the 1995 recipient of the coveted Gold Medallion Award awarded by the Christian Booksellers Association for writing the Book of the Year, i.e., The Names of the Holy Spirit.
He was President of Winnipeg Bible College for five years, leading it to receive American Accreditation and Provincial authority to offer degrees (1960-1965). He taught at Trinity Evangelical Divinity School, in greater Chicago, Illinois, in the field of Religious Education and Evangelism (1965-1971).
He is co-founder of Liberty University, with Jerry Falwell, in 1971, and was the only full-time teacher in the first year of Liberty's existence. Today, the University has over 11,400 students on campus with 39,000 in the Distance Learning Program (now Liberty University Online), and he is the Dean of the School of Religion.
Dr. Towns has given theological lectures and taught intensive seminars at over 50 theological seminaries in America and abroad. He holds visiting professorship rank in five seminaries. He has written over 2,000 reference and/or popular articles and received six honorary doctoral degrees. Four doctoral dissertations have analyzed his contribution to religious education and evangelism.
His personal education includes a B.S. from Northwestern College in Minneapolis, Minnesota, a M.A. from Southern Methodist University in Dallas, Texas, a Th.M. from Dallas Theological Seminary also in Dallas, a MRE from Garrett Theological Seminary in Evanston, Illinois, and a D.Min. from Fuller Theological Seminary in Pasadena, California.
He was President of Winnipeg Bible College for five years, leading it to receive American Accreditation and Provincial authority to offer degrees (1960-1965). He taught at Trinity Evangelical Divinity School, in greater Chicago, Illinois, in the field of Religious Education and Evangelism (1965-1971).
He is co-founder of Liberty University, with Jerry Falwell, in 1971, and was the only full-time teacher in the first year of Liberty's existence. Today, the University has over 11,400 students on campus with 39,000 in the Distance Learning Program (now Liberty University Online), and he is the Dean of the School of Religion.
Dr. Towns has given theological lectures and taught intensive seminars at over 50 theological seminaries in America and abroad. He holds visiting professorship rank in five seminaries. He has written over 2,000 reference and/or popular articles and received six honorary doctoral degrees. Four doctoral dissertations have analyzed his contribution to religious education and evangelism.
His personal education includes a B.S. from Northwestern College in Minneapolis, Minnesota, a M.A. from Southern Methodist University in Dallas, Texas, a Th.M. from Dallas Theological Seminary also in Dallas, a MRE from Garrett Theological Seminary in Evanston, Illinois, and a D.Min. from Fuller Theological Seminary in Pasadena, California.
Ratings & Reviews
Friends & Following
Create a free account to discover what your friends think of this book!
Community Reviews
Displaying 1 - 7 of 7 reviews
April 12, 2023
This was part of a small group of books I used while preaching through the gospel of John this past 18 months or so. I found it sort of by happenstance & I’m glad I did. I got it for a bargain at a thrift store.
The book by Towns was a surprise to me. It had more depth than I had anticipated. There is some explanation of some of the Greek without being overly technical. He has a way of charting things that is a help in some places. He is concise so there were some things I would have enjoyed hearing more about. He is conservative in his theology. A lay person could definitely pick this up and be very comfortable with this and would gain much insight.
It was not warm the way some devotional commentaries are. This is not a major knock, but there isn’t tons of application there if that is what you need. This is more a revealing of what is there and that’s what I needed.
I would definitely recommend.
The book by Towns was a surprise to me. It had more depth than I had anticipated. There is some explanation of some of the Greek without being overly technical. He has a way of charting things that is a help in some places. He is concise so there were some things I would have enjoyed hearing more about. He is conservative in his theology. A lay person could definitely pick this up and be very comfortable with this and would gain much insight.
It was not warm the way some devotional commentaries are. This is not a major knock, but there isn’t tons of application there if that is what you need. This is more a revealing of what is there and that’s what I needed.
I would definitely recommend.
September 3, 2014
An excellent commentary on the Gospel of John in the New Testament! The main textbook for my Bible 323 class, I found this very fun to read. Towns goes through each chapter one at a time (each chapter in the commentary corresponds to the next chapter in the Gospel).
He briefly touches on each of the miraculous signs posited by John to prove the deity of Jesus of Nazareth. I would recommend this to anyone who needs something to help introduce them to John without having to bog their way through an 800-page academic monster.
He briefly touches on each of the miraculous signs posited by John to prove the deity of Jesus of Nazareth. I would recommend this to anyone who needs something to help introduce them to John without having to bog their way through an 800-page academic monster.
May 1, 2021
Dr. Towns frequently overemphasizes the Greek language, committing many of the Exegetical Fallacies in D.A. Carson's book. For example, he spends nearly two pages speaking on the significance in Jesus' wording in John 21 to Peter about shepherding his sheep. There is likely no theological significance in the minute difference in wording. Phileo probably does not have as nuanced a meaning as many seem to think, and most Koine Greek scholars will tell you the same.
Towns overinterprets many things and reads too much into them. He also creates a lot of arbitrary distinctions, list, and categories (He says that when Jesus was raised Thomas was moved volitionally, Mary emotionally, and John intellectually... who's to say that all 3 of them weren't moved in all 3 ways?)
As a person who is conservative theologically, he is guilty of many silly things that some conservative theologians do when trying to fight against theological liberalism, like: overstating their case, or overemphasizing the importance of intellectual arguments.
For example: it was IMPOSSIBLE for the women at the tomb to have gone to the wrong tomb (per the theories of liberal theologians) because they had seen it the day when Jesus was laid in it! Well maybe they got lost. Maybe there were many tombs that looked quite similar in the same general area. I agree that it seems unlikely that they would have gone to the wrong tomb, but not IMPOSSIBLE. It would be a much stronger argument to say that if they went to the wrong tomb the Pharisees had a vested interest in fact checking their resurrection claims and could have easily gone to the right tomb and proved them wrong. I think Case for Christ makes an argument similar to this.
Many conservative theologians seem to think that if the Gospels are not completely chronological then they are not inerrant. No, they're actually only errant if they PRESENT THEMSELVES as being completely chronological. Although there are certain events that the authors present as being tied to one another chronologically, total chronology is not always required. This does not undermine inerrancy. Towns insists that the healing of the of centurion and nobleman's son have to be different events because of chronology, and then he marks out all the differences. I believe that the differences between these events are small enough that they could still be reconciled as the same event. There are other examples of him doing similar things throughout the book.
All of these issues were sort of distracting as I read through. Just be aware of the shortcomings of this commentary before you buy wholesale into what Towns says. Being conservative doesn't always make him right, or he might be right but not for the reasons he provides.
Having said that has good and interesting things to say and makes things accessible to the average believer, which is something that I greatly respect. I am not always sure of the use of highly scholarly works that only 15 whole people will understand and find significant.
Towns overinterprets many things and reads too much into them. He also creates a lot of arbitrary distinctions, list, and categories (He says that when Jesus was raised Thomas was moved volitionally, Mary emotionally, and John intellectually... who's to say that all 3 of them weren't moved in all 3 ways?)
As a person who is conservative theologically, he is guilty of many silly things that some conservative theologians do when trying to fight against theological liberalism, like: overstating their case, or overemphasizing the importance of intellectual arguments.
For example: it was IMPOSSIBLE for the women at the tomb to have gone to the wrong tomb (per the theories of liberal theologians) because they had seen it the day when Jesus was laid in it! Well maybe they got lost. Maybe there were many tombs that looked quite similar in the same general area. I agree that it seems unlikely that they would have gone to the wrong tomb, but not IMPOSSIBLE. It would be a much stronger argument to say that if they went to the wrong tomb the Pharisees had a vested interest in fact checking their resurrection claims and could have easily gone to the right tomb and proved them wrong. I think Case for Christ makes an argument similar to this.
Many conservative theologians seem to think that if the Gospels are not completely chronological then they are not inerrant. No, they're actually only errant if they PRESENT THEMSELVES as being completely chronological. Although there are certain events that the authors present as being tied to one another chronologically, total chronology is not always required. This does not undermine inerrancy. Towns insists that the healing of the of centurion and nobleman's son have to be different events because of chronology, and then he marks out all the differences. I believe that the differences between these events are small enough that they could still be reconciled as the same event. There are other examples of him doing similar things throughout the book.
All of these issues were sort of distracting as I read through. Just be aware of the shortcomings of this commentary before you buy wholesale into what Towns says. Being conservative doesn't always make him right, or he might be right but not for the reasons he provides.
Having said that has good and interesting things to say and makes things accessible to the average believer, which is something that I greatly respect. I am not always sure of the use of highly scholarly works that only 15 whole people will understand and find significant.
March 1, 2019
Autographed!
Excellent study!
Excellent study!
October 2, 2024
I really liked this for what it is, a concise entry level commentary. I found myself grabbing this commentary first as a way to get my head around each chapter before digging in.
June 4, 2012
This was a text for a class I took. Overall, a pretty decent and easy to understand commentary on the gospel of John. Lots of background information.
May 5, 2015
I enjoyed Dr Towns' comments yet was able to identify pieces of his dispensationalists theology interspersed throughout.
Displaying 1 - 7 of 7 reviews