John 7:14-24
The Confusion of Christ
Introduction
A university student was seen with a large "K" printed on his T- shirt. When someone asked him what the "K" stood for, he said, "Confused." "But," the person replied, "you don't spell "confused" with a "K." The student answered, "You don't know how confused I am."
Main Point
Confusion can be entertaining and funny, or, it can be eternally fatal. Being confused over Jesus Christ is just such a fatal matter. If we were to title chapter 7 of John’s Gospel it should probably be something like: “The Confusion Over the Claims of Christ”.
Jesus is in Jerusalem for the 3rd time now. And in chapter 7 He causes a lot of controversy and confusion and division among the people. Some marveled at His claims - others were malicious. Some said He was the Christ, others said He wasn’t. They argued over where He was from. They argued over where the prophets said Christ was supposed to come from. Some said Jesus was wanted dead, others were shocked to learn that He was a hunted man. In this chapter John the Apostle shows the utter confusion by the Jewish crowds over who this Jesus was, what He claimed, and what in the world He was doing.
The world today is still confused and divided over Jesus Christ. Are you confused by Jesus? Do you know who He is? Do you know why He came? Do you know Him?
This Gospel was written so that you would not be confused. Actually, it was written so that you would be convinced. In chapter 20:31 the writer sums up His reason for writing the Gospel: “But these are written that you may believe that Jesus is the Son of God, the Christ, and that by believing you may have life in His name.” John the Apostle wrote these words with the ultimate aim in His heart that you would have eternal life in Jesus’ name. His highest hope is that you would be saved from your sins by believing in the Son of God, Jesus the Christ.
And that is my hope as the pastor of this church. That is my highest hope and my ultimate aim in preaching. So if you are here today and perhaps your life has been confusing, or, chaotic – if you’ve come here today despairing and hopeless because of your sins– if you’ve come because you know that you don’t have the answers and have nothing to offer – then open your ears and prepare your heart because the Gospel of Jesus Christ IS good news. Listen today because the message of salvation is near you.
Today, you will hear that God has so loved the world, that He has so loved you, that He sent His One and His Only Son to die in your place for your sins. And if you repent and call on His Name - if you believe in His Son that He died on the cross for your sins, then you will be saved. I’m not telling you to do more good works. I’m not telling you what religious things you have to do to get God’s favor and to get eternal life.
I’m telling you to trust, to believe, to put your faith in God’s Son. If you do you will be saved and you will receive eternal life in His Name. That is the promise of God.
Don’t be confused like those in the crowd here in chapter 7. As we look at verses 14-24 there are 5 things you don’t want to be confused about concerning Jesus Christ and His claims. There are 5 things to be convicted of concerning the claims Jesus made.
Jesus’ Claims are Amazing (14-15)
First of all, we need to clearly see how Amazing Jesus’ claims are. Verses 14 and 15 say, “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 is at the Feast of the Tabernacles, the greatest Feast of the year for the Jews. It is 7 days long and the 8th day is a Sabbath. About the 4th day into it, Jesus goes into the temple – the heart of Jewish life and worship – and begins to teach. And John says they were amazed at what He said.
People were always amazed at what Jesus said. In Matthew 7:28 it says, “When Jesus had finished speaking the crowds were amazed at His teaching”. In Mark 1:22 it says the people were amazed at His teachings…” In Luke 2:47 Jesus was in the temple at 12 years old and it says, “Everyone who heard Him was amazed at His understanding and His answers.” At the end of John 7 the temple guards couldn’t arrest Jesus because they were amazed at what they heard from Him.
The reason is that His words were the very words of God. In chapter 6, verse 45, Jesus told the Jews that “It is written in the Prophets that ‘They will all be taught by God.’ Everyone who listens to the Father and learns from Him comes to Me.” Jesus taught with authority and amazed people because He was God in the flesh. He wasn’t just another rabbi who attended their rabbinical schools.
Jesus didn’t get education, He is the education. He didn’t learn truth, He is truth (John 14:6). He didn’t gain wisdom, He is the wisdom of God(1 Cor. 1:30). Therefore, when He speaks He speaks with all the authority of the eternal God. And when God speaks, it is amazing to hear.
It is a Christian virtue to marvel in amazement at God’s Word. Job said in chapter 42, verse 3, “Surely I spoke of things I did not understand, things too wonderful for me to know.” Psalm 139:6 says, “Such knowledge is too wonderful; too lofty for me to attain.” Paul says in Romans 11:33, “Oh the depth of the riches of the wisdom and knowledge of God! How unsearchable His judgments, and His paths beyond tracing out!”
Do you know why those people were amazed at His words? Because they were exposed to God’s words. The lack of amazement at God today by Christians is directly related to the utter ignorance and neglect of His Word. You can’t be amazed at the words of God if you’re not exposed to them. Discipline yourself to be in God’s Word to clearly see how amazing His teachings are. Be a Berean with your Bible (Acts 17:11)!
Assurance Comes from Acting Out (16-17)
Secondly, Assurance Comes from Acting On the claims of Jesus. Verses 16 and 17, “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.”
God’s will is that people would believe in Jesus Christ and be saved. When you do that, things happen that prove to you the truth of what Jesus said. Your burden of guilt from your sins will be lifted. You will have a new heart to love God with and to love others with. You will have new desires to live righteously for God and to learn about your heavenly Father. You will be alive like never before because Jesus says you will have passed out of spiritual death into spiritual life. All of this and more is a work God does in you that becomes an “inner-witness” of the truth of Jesus words – that His teachings truly are from God and not from man.
Christians recognize the superiority of Jesus’ words and therefore submit to His Word in obedience. How highly you esteem Jesus’ words is proven by how faithfully you keep them in your living.
Your conviction of the truthfulness of His words, and your faith in His words for daily living comes only by obeying His words. There is trusting Jesus for salvation, and, there is trusting Jesus in salvation. In other words, after you trust Him for salvation, your new life in Him is one of faith in Him; faith to live to God in obedience; faith to deny your old desires in the flesh, faith to grow in the fruits of the Spirit, faith to grow in holy living.
Those believers who do not progress in spiritual maturity are those who have trusted Christ for salvation but do not trust His words for living the Christian life. They don’t know the truth of His teachings because they do not obey His teachings.
In the Bible, knowing the truth only comes after obeying the truth and obeying comes from faith. “If you hold to my teachings you are really my disciples. Then you shall know the truth” – THEN you shall KNOW the truth. After you obey His teachings you will know the truthfulness of His teachings. Faith leads to obedience and obedience leads to knowledge. There is no other way.
It’s All About God (v18)
So we’ve seen that Jesus’ claims are Amazing, and we’ve seen that Assurance of the truthfulness of His claims comes from Acting On them. Thirdly, a person cannot be confused about who it’s all about. We see in verse 18, that Jesus’ claims are All About God. “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.”
Jesus is here contrasting Himself with the other religious leaders in Israel, like the Pharisees and teachers of the law. Jesus sought glory and honor for God; they sought glory and honor for themselves. Jesus called them out on this in chapter 5 when He said, “How can you believe in me if you seek praise from one another..?”
They were all formally trained in the rabbinical schools. They learned what all the rabbi’s taught – their teachings are but rules taught by men – not God (mark 7:7). They learned the oral traditions which were nothing more than man-made religious rules that completely twisted God’s commandments. It became all about self-glory and self-promotion by self-seeking men who sought to be highly honored in the eyes of other men. Jesus rips them for this in Matthew 23 when He says, “Everything they do is done for men to see: They make their phylacteries wide and the tassels on their garments long; they love the place of honor at banquets and the most important seats at the synagogues; they love to be greeted in the marketplaces and to have amen call them ‘Rabbi.’” He goes on with a blistering rebuke and the famous 7 woes to condemn them for their arrogant hypocrisy, and abandoning the commandments of God to follow the commandments of men. For those who follow man-made religion, it’s always about themselves.
But, for Jesus, it was all about God. His words aren’t His, but His Father’s. His motives aren’t for His own glory, but, for His Father’s glory. Jesus’ life perfectly honored someone other than Himself – the Father. He didn’t say what He wanted to, but, what His Father wanted Him to. He did not act by Himself, but, did what His Father planned for Him. He did not act when He wanted to, but, He was submitted to the Father’s timing for everything (v. 6-8). Jesus did nothing independently of His Father, but, everything He did was in perfect harmony with the Father’s will for the Father’s honor. His life perfectly honored the Father.
Is that true in your life? Do you honor the Father in all you say? Do you honor the Father in your life and the choices you make? Is it all about God in how you live or is it all about you? Don’t “honor God with your lips” when your heart is far from Him. But draw near to Him with a sincere heart. Come near to worship Him with a clear conscience.
That Jesus perfectly honored the Father in this way reminds us of the first 18 verses of this Gospel, called the Prologue. In verse 18 John says this about Jesus, “No one has ever seen God, but God the One and Only, who is at the Father’s side, has made Him known.” The Greek for “has made Him known” is exegete. This means to explain, to make you understand, to help you see clearly. I try to exegete the Scriptures to you each week, to explain them to give you understanding of them. Jesus came to exegete – to explain the Father to the world so that the world could know Him. And when a man comes to know God, the truth about God’s character and person, that man realizes that God is to be honored. Jesus told the truth about God – He never told a lie. It was all about God for Jesus.
Who is it all about for you? Each Christian is called to live righteously for the honor of the Father. Every word counts. Every work counts. Every motive and thought counts. Everything in your life either counts for the honor of the Father or it doesn’t.
Accused Conscience (v 19-20)
The 4th thing is An Accused Conscience. In verses 19 and 20 Jesus says, “’Has not Moses given you the Law? Yet none 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?’”
Moses was revered by the Jews. God chose Moses to lead the Israelites out of slavery in Egypt, and, God gave the Israelites the Law through Moses. Yet, Jesus says to them that they failed to keep the Law. The Jews thought because they were God’s chosen people, and because God rescued them out of Egypt, and because God gave them the Law, that they had free passes into God’s grace and get out of hell free cards.
But when Jesus accuses them of failing to keep the law they should have had accused consciences. Then they would have recognized Jesus for who He was – the fulfillment of the very law they failed to fulfill.
Important: Before you can trust Christ as your Savior you have to trust Christ as your Accuser. In other words, you must accept what He says about your lost, sinful condition. Only then are you ready and qualified to accept the forgiveness and salvation He’s offering.
Otherwise there is no hope. If someone says “No, I’m good enough, I can be good enough” then they will turn to doing good deeds and religion and all the while trust that in their own good efforts they can be righteous before God. But the Bible is crystal clear that no one can earn a good standing before God by doing good things.
Romans 3:20 says, “No one will be declared righteous in His sight by observing the law; rather, through the law we become conscious of sin.” Galatians 2:15-16 says, “We who are Jews by birth and not ‘Gentile sinners’ know that a man is not justified by observing the law, but by faith in Jesus Christ. So, we too, have put our faith in Christ Jesus that we may be justified by faith in Christ and not by observing the law, because by observing the law no one will be justified.”
The Law is not a list of good works you can follow to be righteous. The Law was a picture of the righteousness that they were not and could not be on their own. By following the Law they were supposed to see the impossibility of carrying it out which would lead them to see that they could only hope in the mercy of God to provide some way for them to be accepted by Him. Then they would see Christ. He is the One whom the Law pointed to. He is the One who could fulfill the Law.
Accurate Assessment of Jesus’ Claims (21-24)
So we’ve seen Jesus’ claims are Amazing, that they are to be Acted On to be Assured of their truthfulness, they are All About God, and they Accuse our Conscience. Fifthly and Lastly, Jesus’ claims are to be Assessed Accurately. Notice verses 21-24, “Jesus said to them, ‘I did one miracle and you are all astonished. Yet, because Moses gave you circumcision (though actually it came 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 right judgments.’”
Jesus’ question “why are you trying to kill me” is a hinge between what He says in verses 16 – 19 and what He says in verses 21 – 24.
Last time Jesus was in Jerusalem was in chapter 5, and He did two things that made the Jews want to kill Him: He healed a man on the Sabbath and He taught that He was equal with God. These are the two issues that the Jews hated Him for. In verses 18 to 24 Jesus is talking about the charge against Him that He broke the Sabbath last time He was in town.
The Sabbath was commanded by God through Moses to be a day of rest. It was the 7th day of the week, and it was holy to God. It’s in 4th place on the 10 commandments. No regular work was to be done by anyone in Israel. This commandment came after the Israelites came into being as a nation, and after they were rescued out of Egypt by God.
At this time the Jews had all kinds of man-made extra rules on what it meant to “not work” on the Sabbath. Although these started out centuries earlier as good guidelines to keep God’s commandment, they eventually replaced God’s commandments. The guidelines became traditions and their traditions were passed on orally from generation to generation. And each generation of teachers of the law would add to the oral tradition and it became a great source of pride and self-exaltation. Before long the law of God was so buried under all these traditions the only thing they were concerned about was the “traditions.”
What Jesus does here is He exposes their hypocrisy. The very crime they charge Jesus with (breaking the Sabbath) is the very charge that Jesus points out they themselves are breaking.
The Law also commanded that on the 8th day after a male child was born, he was to be circumcised. Now if the 8th day happened to be a Sabbath they would break the Sabbath by doing the “work” of circumcising the boy. They broke the Sabbath too! How could they stand and accuse Him? So why are they trying to kill Him for breaking the Sabbath if they break the Sabbath themselves?
But, if they reasoned that that was not a violation of the Sabbath, then how could they possibly say He violated the Sabbath by healing the whole man and making the whole man well? Regular work was a violation of the Sabbath, but, not doing good.
They made a poor judgment of the character of Christ. He did not violate the law, He fulfilled the law. He kept it perfectly while they failed to keep it. He had to. That is the only way He could be the perfect lamb of God. While they were accusing Him, His heavenly Father approved of Him (John 6:27). He came to them, but they condemned Him. They called Him a sinner, even though He was the sinless One who was saving them from their sins. They completely misjudged who He was.
Don’t you misjudge Jesus. Accurately Assess His claims. They are Amazing Claims. Act On His Claims, they were All About God, they will Accuse your Conscience (which is good).
The Confusion of Christ
Introduction
A university student was seen with a large "K" printed on his T- shirt. When someone asked him what the "K" stood for, he said, "Confused." "But," the person replied, "you don't spell "confused" with a "K." The student answered, "You don't know how confused I am."
Main Point
Confusion can be entertaining and funny, or, it can be eternally fatal. Being confused over Jesus Christ is just such a fatal matter. If we were to title chapter 7 of John’s Gospel it should probably be something like: “The Confusion Over the Claims of Christ”.
Jesus is in Jerusalem for the 3rd time now. And in chapter 7 He causes a lot of controversy and confusion and division among the people. Some marveled at His claims - others were malicious. Some said He was the Christ, others said He wasn’t. They argued over where He was from. They argued over where the prophets said Christ was supposed to come from. Some said Jesus was wanted dead, others were shocked to learn that He was a hunted man. In this chapter John the Apostle shows the utter confusion by the Jewish crowds over who this Jesus was, what He claimed, and what in the world He was doing.
The world today is still confused and divided over Jesus Christ. Are you confused by Jesus? Do you know who He is? Do you know why He came? Do you know Him?
This Gospel was written so that you would not be confused. Actually, it was written so that you would be convinced. In chapter 20:31 the writer sums up His reason for writing the Gospel: “But these are written that you may believe that Jesus is the Son of God, the Christ, and that by believing you may have life in His name.” John the Apostle wrote these words with the ultimate aim in His heart that you would have eternal life in Jesus’ name. His highest hope is that you would be saved from your sins by believing in the Son of God, Jesus the Christ.
And that is my hope as the pastor of this church. That is my highest hope and my ultimate aim in preaching. So if you are here today and perhaps your life has been confusing, or, chaotic – if you’ve come here today despairing and hopeless because of your sins– if you’ve come because you know that you don’t have the answers and have nothing to offer – then open your ears and prepare your heart because the Gospel of Jesus Christ IS good news. Listen today because the message of salvation is near you.
Today, you will hear that God has so loved the world, that He has so loved you, that He sent His One and His Only Son to die in your place for your sins. And if you repent and call on His Name - if you believe in His Son that He died on the cross for your sins, then you will be saved. I’m not telling you to do more good works. I’m not telling you what religious things you have to do to get God’s favor and to get eternal life.
I’m telling you to trust, to believe, to put your faith in God’s Son. If you do you will be saved and you will receive eternal life in His Name. That is the promise of God.
Don’t be confused like those in the crowd here in chapter 7. As we look at verses 14-24 there are 5 things you don’t want to be confused about concerning Jesus Christ and His claims. There are 5 things to be convicted of concerning the claims Jesus made.
Jesus’ Claims are Amazing (14-15)
First of all, we need to clearly see how Amazing Jesus’ claims are. Verses 14 and 15 say, “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 is at the Feast of the Tabernacles, the greatest Feast of the year for the Jews. It is 7 days long and the 8th day is a Sabbath. About the 4th day into it, Jesus goes into the temple – the heart of Jewish life and worship – and begins to teach. And John says they were amazed at what He said.
People were always amazed at what Jesus said. In Matthew 7:28 it says, “When Jesus had finished speaking the crowds were amazed at His teaching”. In Mark 1:22 it says the people were amazed at His teachings…” In Luke 2:47 Jesus was in the temple at 12 years old and it says, “Everyone who heard Him was amazed at His understanding and His answers.” At the end of John 7 the temple guards couldn’t arrest Jesus because they were amazed at what they heard from Him.
The reason is that His words were the very words of God. In chapter 6, verse 45, Jesus told the Jews that “It is written in the Prophets that ‘They will all be taught by God.’ Everyone who listens to the Father and learns from Him comes to Me.” Jesus taught with authority and amazed people because He was God in the flesh. He wasn’t just another rabbi who attended their rabbinical schools.
Jesus didn’t get education, He is the education. He didn’t learn truth, He is truth (John 14:6). He didn’t gain wisdom, He is the wisdom of God(1 Cor. 1:30). Therefore, when He speaks He speaks with all the authority of the eternal God. And when God speaks, it is amazing to hear.
It is a Christian virtue to marvel in amazement at God’s Word. Job said in chapter 42, verse 3, “Surely I spoke of things I did not understand, things too wonderful for me to know.” Psalm 139:6 says, “Such knowledge is too wonderful; too lofty for me to attain.” Paul says in Romans 11:33, “Oh the depth of the riches of the wisdom and knowledge of God! How unsearchable His judgments, and His paths beyond tracing out!”
Do you know why those people were amazed at His words? Because they were exposed to God’s words. The lack of amazement at God today by Christians is directly related to the utter ignorance and neglect of His Word. You can’t be amazed at the words of God if you’re not exposed to them. Discipline yourself to be in God’s Word to clearly see how amazing His teachings are. Be a Berean with your Bible (Acts 17:11)!
Assurance Comes from Acting Out (16-17)
Secondly, Assurance Comes from Acting On the claims of Jesus. Verses 16 and 17, “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.”
God’s will is that people would believe in Jesus Christ and be saved. When you do that, things happen that prove to you the truth of what Jesus said. Your burden of guilt from your sins will be lifted. You will have a new heart to love God with and to love others with. You will have new desires to live righteously for God and to learn about your heavenly Father. You will be alive like never before because Jesus says you will have passed out of spiritual death into spiritual life. All of this and more is a work God does in you that becomes an “inner-witness” of the truth of Jesus words – that His teachings truly are from God and not from man.
Christians recognize the superiority of Jesus’ words and therefore submit to His Word in obedience. How highly you esteem Jesus’ words is proven by how faithfully you keep them in your living.
Your conviction of the truthfulness of His words, and your faith in His words for daily living comes only by obeying His words. There is trusting Jesus for salvation, and, there is trusting Jesus in salvation. In other words, after you trust Him for salvation, your new life in Him is one of faith in Him; faith to live to God in obedience; faith to deny your old desires in the flesh, faith to grow in the fruits of the Spirit, faith to grow in holy living.
Those believers who do not progress in spiritual maturity are those who have trusted Christ for salvation but do not trust His words for living the Christian life. They don’t know the truth of His teachings because they do not obey His teachings.
In the Bible, knowing the truth only comes after obeying the truth and obeying comes from faith. “If you hold to my teachings you are really my disciples. Then you shall know the truth” – THEN you shall KNOW the truth. After you obey His teachings you will know the truthfulness of His teachings. Faith leads to obedience and obedience leads to knowledge. There is no other way.
It’s All About God (v18)
So we’ve seen that Jesus’ claims are Amazing, and we’ve seen that Assurance of the truthfulness of His claims comes from Acting On them. Thirdly, a person cannot be confused about who it’s all about. We see in verse 18, that Jesus’ claims are All About God. “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.”
Jesus is here contrasting Himself with the other religious leaders in Israel, like the Pharisees and teachers of the law. Jesus sought glory and honor for God; they sought glory and honor for themselves. Jesus called them out on this in chapter 5 when He said, “How can you believe in me if you seek praise from one another..?”
They were all formally trained in the rabbinical schools. They learned what all the rabbi’s taught – their teachings are but rules taught by men – not God (mark 7:7). They learned the oral traditions which were nothing more than man-made religious rules that completely twisted God’s commandments. It became all about self-glory and self-promotion by self-seeking men who sought to be highly honored in the eyes of other men. Jesus rips them for this in Matthew 23 when He says, “Everything they do is done for men to see: They make their phylacteries wide and the tassels on their garments long; they love the place of honor at banquets and the most important seats at the synagogues; they love to be greeted in the marketplaces and to have amen call them ‘Rabbi.’” He goes on with a blistering rebuke and the famous 7 woes to condemn them for their arrogant hypocrisy, and abandoning the commandments of God to follow the commandments of men. For those who follow man-made religion, it’s always about themselves.
But, for Jesus, it was all about God. His words aren’t His, but His Father’s. His motives aren’t for His own glory, but, for His Father’s glory. Jesus’ life perfectly honored someone other than Himself – the Father. He didn’t say what He wanted to, but, what His Father wanted Him to. He did not act by Himself, but, did what His Father planned for Him. He did not act when He wanted to, but, He was submitted to the Father’s timing for everything (v. 6-8). Jesus did nothing independently of His Father, but, everything He did was in perfect harmony with the Father’s will for the Father’s honor. His life perfectly honored the Father.
Is that true in your life? Do you honor the Father in all you say? Do you honor the Father in your life and the choices you make? Is it all about God in how you live or is it all about you? Don’t “honor God with your lips” when your heart is far from Him. But draw near to Him with a sincere heart. Come near to worship Him with a clear conscience.
That Jesus perfectly honored the Father in this way reminds us of the first 18 verses of this Gospel, called the Prologue. In verse 18 John says this about Jesus, “No one has ever seen God, but God the One and Only, who is at the Father’s side, has made Him known.” The Greek for “has made Him known” is exegete. This means to explain, to make you understand, to help you see clearly. I try to exegete the Scriptures to you each week, to explain them to give you understanding of them. Jesus came to exegete – to explain the Father to the world so that the world could know Him. And when a man comes to know God, the truth about God’s character and person, that man realizes that God is to be honored. Jesus told the truth about God – He never told a lie. It was all about God for Jesus.
Who is it all about for you? Each Christian is called to live righteously for the honor of the Father. Every word counts. Every work counts. Every motive and thought counts. Everything in your life either counts for the honor of the Father or it doesn’t.
Accused Conscience (v 19-20)
The 4th thing is An Accused Conscience. In verses 19 and 20 Jesus says, “’Has not Moses given you the Law? Yet none 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?’”
Moses was revered by the Jews. God chose Moses to lead the Israelites out of slavery in Egypt, and, God gave the Israelites the Law through Moses. Yet, Jesus says to them that they failed to keep the Law. The Jews thought because they were God’s chosen people, and because God rescued them out of Egypt, and because God gave them the Law, that they had free passes into God’s grace and get out of hell free cards.
But when Jesus accuses them of failing to keep the law they should have had accused consciences. Then they would have recognized Jesus for who He was – the fulfillment of the very law they failed to fulfill.
Important: Before you can trust Christ as your Savior you have to trust Christ as your Accuser. In other words, you must accept what He says about your lost, sinful condition. Only then are you ready and qualified to accept the forgiveness and salvation He’s offering.
Otherwise there is no hope. If someone says “No, I’m good enough, I can be good enough” then they will turn to doing good deeds and religion and all the while trust that in their own good efforts they can be righteous before God. But the Bible is crystal clear that no one can earn a good standing before God by doing good things.
Romans 3:20 says, “No one will be declared righteous in His sight by observing the law; rather, through the law we become conscious of sin.” Galatians 2:15-16 says, “We who are Jews by birth and not ‘Gentile sinners’ know that a man is not justified by observing the law, but by faith in Jesus Christ. So, we too, have put our faith in Christ Jesus that we may be justified by faith in Christ and not by observing the law, because by observing the law no one will be justified.”
The Law is not a list of good works you can follow to be righteous. The Law was a picture of the righteousness that they were not and could not be on their own. By following the Law they were supposed to see the impossibility of carrying it out which would lead them to see that they could only hope in the mercy of God to provide some way for them to be accepted by Him. Then they would see Christ. He is the One whom the Law pointed to. He is the One who could fulfill the Law.
Accurate Assessment of Jesus’ Claims (21-24)
So we’ve seen Jesus’ claims are Amazing, that they are to be Acted On to be Assured of their truthfulness, they are All About God, and they Accuse our Conscience. Fifthly and Lastly, Jesus’ claims are to be Assessed Accurately. Notice verses 21-24, “Jesus said to them, ‘I did one miracle and you are all astonished. Yet, because Moses gave you circumcision (though actually it came 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 right judgments.’”
Jesus’ question “why are you trying to kill me” is a hinge between what He says in verses 16 – 19 and what He says in verses 21 – 24.
Last time Jesus was in Jerusalem was in chapter 5, and He did two things that made the Jews want to kill Him: He healed a man on the Sabbath and He taught that He was equal with God. These are the two issues that the Jews hated Him for. In verses 18 to 24 Jesus is talking about the charge against Him that He broke the Sabbath last time He was in town.
The Sabbath was commanded by God through Moses to be a day of rest. It was the 7th day of the week, and it was holy to God. It’s in 4th place on the 10 commandments. No regular work was to be done by anyone in Israel. This commandment came after the Israelites came into being as a nation, and after they were rescued out of Egypt by God.
At this time the Jews had all kinds of man-made extra rules on what it meant to “not work” on the Sabbath. Although these started out centuries earlier as good guidelines to keep God’s commandment, they eventually replaced God’s commandments. The guidelines became traditions and their traditions were passed on orally from generation to generation. And each generation of teachers of the law would add to the oral tradition and it became a great source of pride and self-exaltation. Before long the law of God was so buried under all these traditions the only thing they were concerned about was the “traditions.”
What Jesus does here is He exposes their hypocrisy. The very crime they charge Jesus with (breaking the Sabbath) is the very charge that Jesus points out they themselves are breaking.
The Law also commanded that on the 8th day after a male child was born, he was to be circumcised. Now if the 8th day happened to be a Sabbath they would break the Sabbath by doing the “work” of circumcising the boy. They broke the Sabbath too! How could they stand and accuse Him? So why are they trying to kill Him for breaking the Sabbath if they break the Sabbath themselves?
But, if they reasoned that that was not a violation of the Sabbath, then how could they possibly say He violated the Sabbath by healing the whole man and making the whole man well? Regular work was a violation of the Sabbath, but, not doing good.
They made a poor judgment of the character of Christ. He did not violate the law, He fulfilled the law. He kept it perfectly while they failed to keep it. He had to. That is the only way He could be the perfect lamb of God. While they were accusing Him, His heavenly Father approved of Him (John 6:27). He came to them, but they condemned Him. They called Him a sinner, even though He was the sinless One who was saving them from their sins. They completely misjudged who He was.
Don’t you misjudge Jesus. Accurately Assess His claims. They are Amazing Claims. Act On His Claims, they were All About God, they will Accuse your Conscience (which is good).
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