Judging Correctly

Good morning, than you for being with us today. After a few months away from the Gospel of John we are once again embarking on our journey through this Gospel to see what God has to teach us through the Apostle John’s account of the life of Jesus.

Background

When we last left the Gospel of John at the end of chapter six, we left Jesus at a critical turning point in His ministry. The crowds that were following Him had been growing as he performed miracles and taught about the Kingdom of God. After the miracle of feeding the 5000, some of the people in the crowd even started thinking about making Jesus their political leader by force. Can you imagine that? Jesus, of course, wanted none of that. He understood that many of the people that made up the crowds were there because they just wanted to see how much they could get out of this up-and-coming star in the land of Judah. Jesus got away from the crowd, and when people found him on the other side of the Sea of Galilee the next day, they wanted more of what he had given them: more miracles, more food, more entertainment. Instead, he gave a speech about the level of commitment that was required to become a true follower of His. The result was not surprising. Most people were not willing to make that kind of commitment, so most of His followers left him after that.

The Festival of Shelters

Some try to tell Jesus who to be

So, at the beginning of chapter seven, Jesus had been doing ministry in Galilee for the past several months, but it would soon be time for the Festival of Shelters (or Feast of Tabernacles, as it’s also called). This was one of the three annual feasts for which Jews were supposed to make their way to Jerusalem to celebrate. It usually took place in October, after the grape and olive harvest, and it was a kind of celebration of the end of the harvest season. By this time in the harvest cycle, the rains had ceased a while back, and the ground was often dry and parched after having endured several months of drought. Water reserves in towns and villages were running low too. But soon, the “early rains” would start to fall, preparing the land for the hard work of breaking up and loosening the soil ahead of the time of planting, and beginning the harvest cycle all over again.

The way they celebrated this festival was to set up temporary shelters or tents, in which they would live for a week. Even people who were from Jerusalem would set up a tent outside their home or on the flat roof of the home. This reminded them of the forty years they spent wandering in the desert before entering the Promised Land. It reminded them of God’s provision for them during those years. Those were ways the festival reminded them of God’s faithfulness in the past. But the festival also had an element of declaring to God that they needed His provision in the present too, and it also emphasized the people’s dependence on God for the water which they needed for the success of a new harvest cycle.

As we go through today’s passage, this information might not seem as important or relevant, but over the next few weeks, as we get into some of the other parts of chapter seven and chapter eight, which were all one long conversation Jesus had, you’ll understand how the context of this teaching really becomes important to His message.

If you have your Bible with you, please turn with me to John chapter seven. If you don’t, you can follow along with me on the screen above.

Christian Standard Bible Chapter 7

7 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,ar was near. 3 So his brothers said to him, “Leave here and go to Judea so 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.

JESUS AT THE FESTIVAL OF SHELTERS

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

14 When the festival was already half over, Jesus went up into the temple and began to teach. 15 Then the Jews were amazed and said, “How is this man so learned, since he hasn’t been trained?”

16 Jesus answered them, “My teaching isn’t mine but is from the one who sent me. 17 If anyone wants to do his will, he will know whether the teaching is from God or whether I am speaking on my own. 18 The one who speaks on his own seeks his own glory; but he who seeks the glory of the one who sent him is true, and there is no unrighteousness in him. 19 Didn’t Moses give you the law? Yet none of you keeps the law. Why are you trying to kill me?”

20 “You have a demon!” the crowd responded. “Who is trying to kill you?”

21 “I performed one work, and you are all amazed,” Jesus answered. 22 “This is why Moses has given you circumcision—not that it comes from Moses but from the fathers—and you circumcise a man on the Sabbath. 23 If a man receives circumcision on the Sabbath so that the law of Moses won’t be broken, are you angry at me because I made a man entirely well on the Sabbath? 24 Stop judging according to outward appearances; rather judge according to righteous judgment.”

Let’s Pray.

Today as we look at this passage of Scripture, I want to look at the different reasons why people misunderstand Jesus, and how Jesus gives us a way that we can know who He truly is.

The first part of the passage tells us about Jesus’ interaction with his brothers. The Bible teaches us that after Mary gave birth to Jesus, she and Joseph went on to have a number of other children together, like any other normal family of that time would have. We know that Jesus had at least two brothers, James and Jude, and we know that he had sisters, although their names aren’t mentioned. In John chapter seven, the Apostle John tells us about how his brothers felt about Jesus and his ministry. John tells us that even Jesus’ brothers didn’t believe Jesus was who He claimed to be, at least not at this time in their lives. Instead, they were trying to tell Jesus what He should do and how He should act if He’s going to become the kind of leader they thought he should be. This leads me to the first reason why people misunderstand who Jesus is.

1. Some people try to tell Jesus who He should be.

Jesus, and how Jesus gives us a way that we can know who He truly is.

Jesus’ brothers were trying to tell Him what kind of leader He needed to be. Or, at least, what kind of leader THEY THOUGHT He needed to be. See, they had heard him preach His messages, they had come around at one point trying to get their crazy big brother to come home with them and stop stirring up trouble, but he had refused. Eventually, Jesus’ ministry started to gain momentum and popularity, and maybe they figured that it wasn’t such a bad thing to be related to the most popular guy around. In fact, maybe they could help him become the kind of brother they really wanted to have around, a guy with power and influence, who had lots of followers to dote on Him. Or maybe, they just wanted to have fun with him, and were making fun of his miracles and were speaking sarcastically. Either way, they were trying to tell Jesus who they thought He should be. “Come on Jesus, you should be all about being recognized publicly. Go show the world how awesome you are! Do your miracles in front of the huge crowds that are going to be in Jerusalem for the festival. Maybe you’ll get your big crowds of followers back again.” The thing is, their ideas for Jesus showed that they clearly had not been listening to what He had been saying about Himself or His purposes.

Sometimes that’s how people are today with Jesus. They have this idea of who THEY think Jesus should be, and they try to get Him to fit into their mold.

Some people think about what THEIR ideal savior would be like and try to get Jesus to be those things for them.

For example, their idea of Jesus is that He is nice guy in a robe who is there to make them feel better about themselves when they feel bad, help them be nice to others, and maybe give them a gentle scolding when they do something they know they shouldn’t do, with a “let’s try not to do that again, okay buddy?” for good measure. They think of Him as this humble person that is just hoping and waiting for someone to listen to Him, hoping that we will do him the honor of following Him. They think of Jesus as a patient and tolerant character who puts up with all the times they choose to live life their own way instead of asking Him how He wants them to live. “Jesus, you’re just here to punch my ticket to heaven and cheer me on when I’m feeling low. Leave me alone to make my own decisions about how I spend my time, how I use my money, how I handle my relationships, and what my life is all about,” they say That’s the kind of Jesus many people want to have, and that’s how many people try to make Jesus behave in their lives.

2. Some people’s understanding of who Jesus is, is based on what the they’ve heard from other’s experiences, not their own.

Then there’s others that have never really experienced Jesus personally, or engaged Him directly. In Jerusalem, there were many people who had heard about this Jesus character. They hadn’t been there the other times He had done miracles; they hadn’t heard Him preach; they hadn’t seen Him in action at all. All they had to go on was what other people were saying about Him. “This guy does some amazing things that only a truly righteous man could do,” said some. “No, this guy is a troublemaker. He heals people on the Sabbath and breaks the Law of Moses. If He really was righteous, He wouldn’t break the Sabbath,” replied others. “You should hear how He talks to the religious leaders, He really calls them out when no one else dares to,” some share with a grin. “That’s called disrespect, he doesn’t respect the leaders, or our traditions, and is trying to tell us we got it all wrong,” objects the guy next to him. People had all kinds of opinions about Jesus based on stories they heard others tell, but few of them expressed them too loudly because they didn’t want to make the religious leaders mad at them.

Some had made up their minds about who Jesus was, a good person or a deceiver. Others, still couldn’t figure out what to make of Him. “How is it that He knows so much if none of the top religious teachers we follow ever taught Him how to think and how to interpret Scripture?” Jesus didn’t fit into their boxes, and many were still undecided about Him.

There are many voices in the world trying to tell us who Jesus is.

There are people today who are just as confused or misled as the crowds were in Jesus’ day. Most of the people alive today have never had a direct encounter with Jesus Himself. They haven’t even really spent any serious amount of time reading the Bible to be able to know what Jesus says about Himself, and to hear what He taught about life and living. Their entire understanding of Jesus is based on stories they’ve heard, rumors that have been spread, or opinions by people who honestly haven’t really done much honest investigation into Jesus either, but they’ve got a lot to say about Him. Maybe they’re grown up believing the official opinion shared in most schools and universities today, that, “We base our understanding of the world on science and history, and proven facts, and anyone who believes in the stories in the Bible are as crazy as those who believe the stories of the ancient Greek gods and old fairy tales. Religion is for the gullible and those who can’t think for themselves.” People are bombarded with these messages from an early age, and their ideas about God and about Jesus are formed by these voices.

Others, unfortunately, had a bad experience with people who said they knew Jesus. Maybe they grew up in church, or had a family member who was religious, and they just weren’t a very attractive example of anything they want to be a part of. Countless people never really encountered Jesus directly, but the so-called Christians they knew ended up hurting them, showing themselves to be hypocrites, or came across as just generally hateful and unpleasant people to be around. They ended up deciding they wanted nothing to do with this Jesus character, if that’s what His followers are like.

Almost as damaging as that are the people who also don’t ever really personally experience Jesus, but they live off of the experience of others. They have grown up going to church hearing the fun Bible stories, and they’ve taken in the stories about following the Ten Commandments and being good people. They’ve been told that all they needed to do was pray a special thirty-second prayer where they admitted to God they needed to be forgiven, and asked God to forgive them, and poof! Suddenly they were told they’ve got their ticket to heaven, and now they don’t have to be scared of hell anymore. But months and years later, they still haven’t actually had a REAL encounter with Jesus. They just assume the Christian life is kind of boring, at least on Sundays when you have to give up a few hours to sing some songs and hear a guy talk for a while before you can go home and watch the game or go fishing. They never realized that Jesus is more than just a nice guy who gets you to heaven. Of all the tragedies, this is probably the biggest, because when that person dies and stands before God, they will be shocked to learn that trying to get by on someone else’s experience of Jesus just doesn’t cut it in the end, especially since it’s possible the other person was doing the same thing they did and is in for a shock too when their turn comes to face God.

So if we don’t get to tell Jesus who we want Him to be, and we don’t get anything out of basing our understanding of Jesus on what other people say about Him, then what IS the right way for us to know Jesus?

Jesus begins to teach

3. Jesus Himself tells us who He is.

Jesus went to Jerusalem without making a big scene or announcing His arrival. In a way, this allowed Him to hear what people were saying about Him because he was just another guy walking through town or going to the Temple, and people felt free to talk. So he went to the temple and started teaching. Pretty quickly, some people started to question him. “Jesus, you haven’t been trained. How do you know so much?” In other words, they were saying that he didn’t have any credentials to show off. He didn’t have anything that would give Him credibility and authority in their eyes. Jesus responded in the same way He had done before when people questioned His authority. “I’m only saying what God told me to say. He sent me, and my authority as I teach comes from Him. Anyone who wants to obey God with their lives can see that my teaching is from God.” The opposite of that, which Jesus didn’t say, but which I’m sure everyone heard loud and clear, was that anyone who didn’t agree with His teaching clearly wasn’t really looking to follow God.

Jesus says the same thing to people today. He tells each one of us,

Jesus says, “Listen to my teaching. If you truly want to follow God that means that you will obey Him. You can’t say you want to follow God and then ignore what God asks you to do.”

People who do that on a regular basis CANNOT be followers of God. Being a follower means you obey. I’m not saying that followers are perfect and we always do what we should, but we need to be obeying what God tells us to do more often than not. Someone who is a new Christian, or an immature Christian might have many more struggles obeying God. It’s hard to do sometimes. It requires us to allow God to transform our lives from the inside out. We looked at this in our Wednesday night Bible study a couple of weeks ago. It’s a process that takes time and effort as Jesus transforms our thoughts, and our desires, then he works on our will, and our relationships and purpose in life. But the more we grow and the more we mature spiritually, the more we will be obeying God, and we will have fewer and fewer areas of our lives where we resist doing what God wants us to do.

Jesus went into the temple knowing that some people wanted him to be a certain way, just like His brothers. His response was to not bow to what people wanted Him to be, but to remain what God had called Him to be.

Jesus will always remain the person God called Him to be. We can’t change Him, and we can’t make him into someone we wish He’d be instead.

Jesus went into the temple also knowing that some people were getting their information about Him second hand and third hand. Some of them liked Him, but they had never encountered Him personally. Others opposed Him, and accused Him of being something other than what He really was. Jesus came into a place full of people who were confused, misled, who had had bad experiences, who didn’t like what they heard. To all of these people He said,

Jesus says, “If you are truly wanting to follow God, you will obey Him. And if you are truly a follower of God, you will know that what I say about myself and about God’s kingdom and His purposes, all of that comes from God.”

In the last few verses of today’s passage, Jesus started to teach the people a lesson that had been repeated over and over in the Gospel of John. He talked about the difference between living a life that is based on following rules and external appearances, versus living a life based on a relationship with God Himself. The life based on rules and appearances always gets complicated when one rule seems to be in conflict with another rule. A life based on rules and appearances sometimes results in people getting angry about righteous acts, like healing someone on the Sabbath. Our passage ends with Jesus’ solution to this problem. “Stop judging according to outward appearances; rather judge according to righteous judgment.” The NIV says, “Instead, judge correctly.” This statement speaks on more than one level. On the one hand, people were judging Jesus based on a poor system of judging by outward appearances and rules. Jesus was saying that we are to judge Him, not on the basis of rules and appearances, but on the basis of a relationship with God, and a desire to follow God, in which case we would judge correctly that Jesus is truly speaking God’s words, and is truly the Righteous One who God sent to save the world.

How do we do that? Jesus just told us.

The way to judge Jesus correctly, and know who He is, is to believe what He tells us about Himself.

If Jesus is speaking God’s words, then the things He says about Himself are true, and we need to study what Jesus says about Himself and experience Him directly. As we read the Bible and God reveals to us things in the New and Old Testaments that speak about God, about the Messiah in the OT, and about Jesus in the NT, we let those insights and the things we learn bring us into a direct experience betwen us and Jesus. The more we know what the Bible says about Him, the more we will know and experience Him if we allow God to connect those truths to our hearts and grow our faith by what we read.

Jesus’ statement about judging correctly also speaks on another level. Jesus was pointing out how a life lived following rules and keeping up appearances sometimes results in conflict between rules. However, a life lived with a goal of following God and obeying Him through a relationship with Him in Jesus Christ leads us to making correct judgments about how to live life.

A growing relationship with Jesus Christ is how we grow in our ability to know how to live our lives and make correct judgments about what we should do.

So where do you find yourself today? Are you someone who has a habit of trying to get Jesus to fit into the mold of an ideal savior you’ve created out of your own preferences? Maybe it’s time to surrender to Jesus and recognize that Jesus will always be who He has told us He is in Scripture. Maybe today is the day you need to embrace Jesus just as he is, not as you wish He was.

Are you someone who has always experienced Jesus through second-hand or third-hand experiences of others? You’ve always just depended on what others told you about who Jesus is instead of letting Him speak to you directly. Maybe today is the day you need to ask Jesus to meet you one-on-one and make Himself real to you personally.

Jesus is not trying to hide from you and me. He desires for every one of us to know Him personally and experience Him individually in deeper and deeper ways throughout our lives. Ask Him to meet you where you are, and He will answer.

Let’s pray.