Thursday, June 21,
2012, 5:54 a.m. – The Lord woke me this morning with the song “Your Servant Witness” playing in my
mind. Speak, Lord, for your servant is listening. I read John 7:1-24 (NIV 1984):
After this, Jesus went
around in Galilee, purposely staying away from Judea because the Jews there
were waiting to take his life. But when the Jewish Feast of Tabernacles was
near, Jesus’ brothers said to him, “You ought to leave here and go to Judea, so
that your disciples may see the miracles you do. No one who wants to become a
public figure acts in secret. Since you are doing these things, show yourself
to the world.” For even his own brothers did not believe in him.
Therefore Jesus told
them, “The right time for me has not yet come; for you any time is right. The
world cannot hate you, but it hates me because I testify that what it does is
evil. You go to the Feast. I am not yet going up to this Feast, because for me
the right time has not yet come.” Having said this, he stayed in Galilee.
However, after his
brothers had left for the Feast, he went also, not publicly, but in secret. Now
at the Feast the Jews were watching for him and asking, “Where is that man?”
Among the crowds there
was widespread whispering about him. Some said, “He is a good man.”
Others replied, “No,
he deceives the people.” But no one would say anything publicly about him for
fear of the Jews.
Not until halfway
through the Feast did Jesus go up to the temple courts and begin to teach. The
Jews were amazed and asked, “How did this man get such learning without having
studied?”
Jesus answered, “My
teaching is not my own. It comes from him who sent me. If anyone chooses to do
God’s will, he will find out whether my teaching comes from God or whether I
speak on my own. He who speaks on his own does so to gain honor for himself,
but he who works for the honor of the one who sent him is a man of truth; there
is nothing false about him. Has not Moses given you the law? Yet not one of you
keeps the law. Why are you trying to kill me?”
“You are demon-possessed,”
the crowd answered. “Who is trying to kill you?”
Jesus said to them, “I
did one miracle, and you are all astonished. Yet, because Moses gave you
circumcision (though actually it did not come from Moses, but from the
patriarchs), you circumcise a child on the Sabbath. Now if a child can be
circumcised on the Sabbath so that the law of Moses may not be broken, why are
you angry with me for healing the whole man on the Sabbath? Stop judging by
mere appearances, and make a right judgment.”
My Understanding: Ever
since Jesus healed the lame man on the Sabbath, and he made public statements
intimating his own equality with God, i.e. his Deity, the Jews had been
plotting how to take Jesus’ life; to kill him. They accused him of breaking the
Sabbath and of blasphemy. Jesus went around in Galilee, but he avoided Judea,
because he knew the Jews were waiting there to take his life.
In Unbelief
The Jewish Feast of Tabernacles was near, so Jesus’ brothers
spoke to him concerning the feast, and concerning Jesus’ public ministry. Since
John qualified the brothers’ statement to Jesus with “For even his own brothers
did not believe in him,” we can assume his brothers were not well meaning in
what they said. The word “for,” in this context, is stating a reason why
something happened or was done. The reason, thus, that the brothers said what
they said to Jesus was because they did not believe in him.
So, in unbelief, and probably out of jealousy, they
encouraged him to go to Judea so that his disciples could see the miracles that
he did. They said, “No one who wants to become a public figure acts in secret.
Since you are doing these things, show yourself to the world.” Yet, we know
that large crowds had already followed Jesus and that he fed at least 5,000 of
them who had followed him to hear his words, and because they saw his miracles
he had performed on the sick (see John 6). So, obviously Jesus was not acting
in secret.
When I read what the brothers said to Jesus, and the fact
that they said what they said because they did not believe in him, I couldn’t
help but see that they were taunting and mocking him to some degree, and that
their comments were dripping with sarcasm. There is also the sense in which
they were, in a mocking sort of way, tempting him to make a reputation for
himself, to work to draw large crowds of people to himself, and to gain notoriety
for himself. Their comments to Jesus reminded me of Satan’s words when he said,
“If you are the Son of God… tell these stones to become bread… throw yourself
down” (and then he quoted scripture). And, when Jesus was hanging on the cross,
passersby hurled insults at him and said, “Come down from the cross, if you are
the Son of God!”
Jesus’ response to the brothers was that the right time for
Jesus had not come, but that for them, any time was right. What he was saying
was that he answered to God the Father, that he was on the Father’s timetable,
and that his mission was to do the work and the will of the Father, not the
will of man. He did not perform like a trained monkey on the command or
suggestion of men, nor did he do what men thought he should do or when they
thought he ought to do it. He was single-minded in his purpose and in his
mission, and he would not allow anyone to tempt him to detract from his reason
for existence.
Yet, for his brothers, this was not the case. He was suggesting,
basically, that they did what they wanted when they wanted to do it, and that
they were not being directed by God in how to live their lives, because they
did not believe in the one that the Father had sent. They were not in tune with
God and with God’s will for their lives. As well, Jesus intimated that by their
lifestyles and/or by their words they did not confront the world with its sin,
therefore, the world could not hate them. Yet, Jesus testified to the world
that their deeds were evil, and that is why they hated him, and why they wanted
him dead – to shut him up!
Right and Wrong
Judging
The people were watching and waiting for Jesus to show up at
the feast. While they were waiting, they talked about Jesus among themselves.
Some said he was a good man, while others said he deceived the people. How can
people get two opposite impressions of one man? It is because we are human and
flawed people who are subject to flawed judgment. We have the tendency within
our sinful nature to make surface evaluations of people without even getting to
know them. Or, we compare them to ourselves, thinking they should act like we
do, talk like we do, or do the same kinds of things as we do. Or, we may judge
them by our culture or by our traditions of men, too. If people are different
from us, we might tag them as “weird” or even think their way of doing things
is wrong just because it is different (not because it is sinful behavior as
clearly defined in scripture).
About halfway through the Feast Jesus showed up and began
teaching in the temple courts. The Jews were amazed by his teaching, because he
didn’t have the “Bible College” or “Seminary” training of one who would teach
in such a way.
Jesus answered that his teaching was not his own. It came
from the Father, who sent him. I love it! Jesus didn’t get his teaching from
book smarts nor did he borrow it from learned men. He didn’t talk just to hear
himself talk or to sound important or to rattle off all of what he learned in “Seminary”
in order to impress people. He was speaking in the power of God, and in the
purpose and will of God, and he spoke for no other reason, though the people
may have judged otherwise.
Then, he made an interesting statement that was also very
telling. He said that anyone who chooses to do God’s will should be able to
discern whether Jesus was speaking of his own accord or whether his teaching
did, indeed, come from God. I am sure that did not win him any brownie points,
yet what he was saying, in essence, was that he was God, he came from God, and he
spoke the words of God, so anyone truly seeking God and his will for their
lives should be sensitized in their spirits in realizing that Jesus was of God
and his words were of God.
His brothers were trying to tempt him to go out on his own
and to speak on his own in order to gain the approval of man, yet Jesus said
that anyone who speaks on his own does so to gain honor for himself, but he who
works for the honor of God the Father is a person of truth. And, then he
suggested that the Jews who were trying to kill him were not men of truth and
honor, because, although they claimed to adhere to the Ten Commandments, they
did not keep the Ten Commandments, because they hated Jesus and they planned to
kill him.
And, then Jesus basically “called a spade a spade.” He called
the Jews “on the carpet” for their hypocrisy. Jesus reminded them that they had
no issue with circumcising babies on the Sabbath in order to not break the Law
of Moses, which called for circumcision on the 8th day of life of a
newborn baby. In other instances he reminded them of how they would rescue a
sheep which had fallen into a pit on the Sabbath, and of how much more valuable
human life is than sheep. In the same manner, Jesus was chiding the Jews here
for their double-standard. It was ok for them to circumcise or to rescue a
sheep on the Sabbath, both of which are work, yet it was not ok for Jesus to
heal a person on the Sabbath. How ridiculous is that? What right did they have
to be angry with Jesus? Obviously there was something much more deep-rooted
here than just concern over the breaking of the Sabbath. They hated him because
he “called a spade a spade,” because he “called them on the carpet” for their
hypocrisy and their wickedness, and because he was a threat to the power of the
religious leaders, because they were jealous of him, and because he claimed to
be God.
A Right Judgment
Jesus said to them, “Stop judging by mere appearances, and
make a right judgment.”
Jesus said to his disciples that if he was hated, they also
would be hated. They would face much the same treatment as what Jesus
experienced. So, as Christ’s followers, we should expect that we, too, will
face false judgments because people are human and they do make surface evaluations
based upon appearance. People will judge us by their own sets of standards
which may or may not be hypocritical, but probably will be steeped in
traditionalism and culture, i.e. in what they have been taught by men, or in
prejudice (racial; social; economic; religious; cultural or other demographic
status). Yet, we must hold to the standard set for us by God, and we must
follow Jesus Christ in obedience even if we are hated, hunted down, persecuted,
mocked, ridiculed, rejected and killed for our testimony for Jesus Christ. We
must hold to what is true and never give way to a lie.
Also, we need to be careful that we are not guilty of making
surface evaluations of people and end up condemning them because we judged by
appearance, prejudice, tradition, culture, or by what we were taught by men. We
need to hold to the truth of scripture so that we make right judgments based on
truth and that result in understanding, love, forgiveness and restoration, not
in condemnation. Then we will make a right judgment.
Your Servant Witness
/ An Original Work / March 13, 2012
Humbly I bow, Lord,
before You,
Bringing my requests
to You.
May I listen; hear You
speaking.
May I follow You in
truth.
Gently lead me in Your
service.
Guide my steps and
strengthen me.
Fill me with Your love
and mercy.
May I live for Thee!
Let me be Your servant
witness,
Telling others of Your
grace.
May I always share the
gospel
With those I meet face
to face.
May I show the love of
Jesus,
Caring for the needs
of men;
Be Your servant witness
always
For my Lord, Amen!
My desire to be like
Jesus,
Living for Him ev’ry
day.
May I obey all His
teachings
Given me, so I’ll not
stray.
Love You, Jesus, Lord,
my master.
You are the King of my
heart;
Follow You where’er
You lead me;
Not from You depart!
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