More Than You Think

Intro

Last week, we spent quite a bit of time looking at the setting for the next several lessons. Then we looked at the opening verses of John chapter 7.

Tell me what is going on in Judea at this time

Feast of Booths

Do you remember what this feast was for?

A reminder of the Exodus and desert wanderings, as well as thanksgiving to God for all His blessings on Israel.

Taking place at the time of the Harvest, shortly after the Passover and Day of Atonement.

In our text last week, we covered John 7.1-9

John 7:1–9 CSB

1 After this, Jesus traveled in Galilee, since he did not want to travel in Judea because the Jews were trying to kill him. 2 The Jewish Festival of Shelters was near. 3 So his brothers said to him, “Leave here and go to Judea so that your disciples can see your works that you are doing. 4 For no one does anything in secret while he’s seeking public recognition. If you do these things, show yourself to the world.” 5 (For not even his brothers believed in him.) 6 Jesus told them, “My time has not yet arrived, but your time is always at hand. 7 The world cannot hate you, but it does hate me because I testify about it—that its works are evil. 8 Go up to the festival yourselves. I’m not going up to this festival, because my time has not yet fully come.” 9 After he had said these things, he stayed in Galilee.

Then, I left off on v. 10 for us to ponder this week.

He Went To The Festival

John 7:10 CSB

10 After his brothers had gone up to the festival, then he also went up, not openly but secretly.

Now, Jesus did tell His brothers that He would not be going up to the feast! But, then, we see in verse 10 that He then went after they had gone ahead.

How do you explain the difficulty in this text?

It has been misconstrued for the start, I believe I read one of the early church Fathers say that even in the 4th century or so, that Jesus here was made a liar. “He told His siblings He would not go, but He knew all along that He would,” so they claim. These are those who weak in theology, combative to the truth, or otherwise heretical in doctrine.

Now, we know the Lord Jesus to be utterly w/out sin, yes? For, “He was tempted in all ways like us, yet w/out sin,” as the Hebrew Author said. Any inclination, therefore, that would have the Lord succumb to the temptation to lie makes Jesus into less than Almighty God incarnate — a doctrine which no one knowing the Lord can tolerate.

There are a few ways I know of which have been employed here.

That He changed His mind after having told His brothers He would not go.

This is one of the common ways used to make the text cohesive to the rest of what we know about Jesus to be true.

This way of reading the text prevents the “liar” heresy, while admitting that it does indeed appear that He had no intention of going at all.

The draw back I see to this view point is that we also know Jesus could know the inner thoughts of people around Him and would prophesy — to say that He did not know He would end up going at this point, in my opinion, seems to be a bit incompatible with these truths of Christ. Is it impossible, no! Not at all. Merely, it is improbably as far as I can tell.

Another way of looking at it, and the other most popular consensus, is that Jesus did not say He would not be going up at all; rather, what He meant was that He would not be going up yet, all the while knowing exactly when it would be most advantageous to be there.

This mode of reading the text also allows for the Lord to have made a truthful statement, as we know He did, while also allowing for the Lord to have known exactly what He was up to.

This seems to be, from what I was able to read, the most common way of looking at this text.

A similar way to see it, which a friend of mine pointed out, could be that He meant He would not go up w/ His brothers at that time.

This is the view I take on the matter.

They Talked…Quietly

John 7:11–13 CSB

11 The Jews were looking for him at the festival and saying, “Where is he?” 12 And there was a lot of murmuring about him among the crowds. Some were saying, “He’s a good man.” Others were saying, “No, on the contrary, he’s deceiving the people.” 13 Still, nobody was talking publicly about him for fear of the Jews.

What were the people saying about Jesus here?

Good man

Deceiving people

Leading people astray

Same word as in James 5.14

James 5:19 CSB

19 My brothers and sisters, if any among you strays from the truth, and someone turns him back,

Means to leave the correct path.

How were they talking about Jesus?

Privately, for fear of the officials

Lord, Liar, Lunatic

Now, to be totally transparent, this part of the lesson is not original to me — I am borrowing a phrasing from CS Lewis.

What I want to see about the people speaking on Jesus is not they were disagreeing, but what specifically they were saying. For, they were still missing the point about Jesus entirely.

In our modern day, it is still a common argument to hear of Jesus “He was a good man/good teacher/moral teacher, but He was not God.” In fact, they Islamic idea of Jesus is predicated on the idea that He is a Prophet, yet nothing more! CS Lewis raised the question in Mere Christianity whether He would be a good man or not, if He were not God incarnate as He claimed.

We saw back in Chapter 5 how He obviously made claims to Godhead by calling Himself the Son, and also in telling Nicodemus that He is the Begotten Son of God. These are obvious, at least to the original hearers, claims to Godhead which would be blasphemous — if they were not true!

There are only 3 Possibilities about who Christ is, given this fact — as raised by CS Lewis:

Liar: If His claims to Godhead are not true, and He knew them to be untrue, then that would indeed make Him a liar! Now, if we are going to say that Jesus is good man but not God, we have to look at these claims and answer whether a liar can be a good person! Who among us would say that a person making a habit of lying about himself and lying to everyone they meet would be a really good person? Surely, we would be hard pressed to call them such.

Lunatic: The second possibility is that, maybe, He would have just been crazy! Think of it — a man claims to be God and goes out of his way to confront the authorities as if he were above them, then takes it all the way to death. If it were not true when He claimed to be God, yet He believed it to be true, in order to go through all that persecution a person would have to be out of their mind!

LORD: Finally, we come to the truth. If He claimed to be God, and is God truly incarnate, then He is Lord and deserving of our loyalty, worship, and lives. If He truly is God in flesh then the only explanation is that He alone is Lord over all the universe and He will come to judge the world in righteousness. And we know that He is Lord because He rose from the dead to never go back to the grave again — and He as being alive gives life to all who willingly bend their knee to Him in reverent awe and worship.

This is what they all missed as they talked about Him! They all missed that this man would truly be God among them! Emmanuel had come!

Don’t Be Shy

And they spoke of Him shyly in the shadows and in hushed tones because they were afraid of the officials hearing them talk.

We who know the Lord must never be like them! Shout it from the rooftops and proclaim it by your life as much as your lips that Jesus Christ is Lord! For millennia men and women have died valiantly serving the Lord, and faith has made its way to each corner of creation through courageous faith and loyalty to Christ as King. Brethren, the truth of Christ must make it to the people God brings in front of us.

I would never say that I tell everyone I meet about Jesus; in many ways I’m still learning how to and I show you what I find. But we have to be sure that we do not speak of Christ only under lock and key. Proclaim to Good News, because it is the only true News worthy of being heard by every ear and heart among men.