American Loon

We are now in John 7 and it starts out with “After this…” indicating a period of time elapsing between the last event listed in the previous scripture and this new one. It states that Jesus was walking about Galilee and would not go to Judea because the Jews were seeking to kill him. (v. 1) These Jews were the Pharisees and scribes, those who ruled the people, that had seen the signs and wonders that Jesus had done and were not moved to believe, only hate Him for violating their rules and making their false righteousness evident to all. His brothers, those born from Mary, so really half brothers came to him: “Leave here and go to Judea, that your disciples also may see the works you are doing. For no one works in secret if he seeks to be known openly. If you do these things, show yourself to the world.” (vv. 3-4) It also said that His brothers did not believe in Him. (v. 5) From Matthew Henry’s Concise Commentary: “The brethren or kinsmen of Jesus were disgusted, when they found there was no prospect of worldly advantages from him.”

This tells you how entrenched these people were to their rebellious attitudes. Something that is a hallmark of their heritage. A good portion of the Old Testament deals with Jews rebelling and God warning them to repent. Read it, it’s a very instructional story. (Genesis 1 to Malachi 4)

During this time, the Feast of Booths was going on, also known as the Feast of Tabernacles or by its Hebrew name, Sukkot, this celebration was the last of the fall festivals and was held at the end of the agricultural year when the grapes and olives were harvested in Israel. This was a time to thank God for all of the preceding year’s provisions and to pray for a good rainy season, which lasted from October through March. Sukkot was designed to remember the wilderness journey from Egypt to Canaan, when God made the people live in booths (Lev. 23:33–43). It was a beloved festival that the people looked forward to.

Jesus responds to His brothers: “My time has not yet come, but your time is always here. The world cannot hate you, but it hates me because I testify about it that its works are evil. You go up to the feast. I am not yet going up to this feast, for my time has not yet fully come.” (vv. 6-8) After telling them this, Jesus remained in Galilee. (v. 9)

After His brothers go off to the feast and know this Feast of Booths lasts 7 days, Jesus goes also to the feast, but in private. (v. 10) Many people were looking for Him. The Pharisees because they wanted to kill Him, but others also were looking for Him and talking about Him. Some said He was good and others said He led people astray. And nobody said anything too loudly because they feared the Pharisees. (vv. 11-13)

During the middle of the feast, Jesus went up and began to teach in the Temple. (v. 14) The Jews, and I think this means all of them, marveled at what He said and the authority in how He said it. They knew who He was and where He was from and also knew that a simple carpenter could not have this knowledge. “How is it that this man has learning, when he has never studied?” (v. 15)

Jesus answered them, “My teaching is not mine, but his who sent me. If anyone’s will is to do God’s will, he will know whether the teaching is from God or whether I am speaking on my own authority. The one who speaks on his own authority seeks his own glory; but the one who seeks the glory of him who sent him is true, and in him there is no falsehood. Has not Moses given you the law? Yet none of you keeps the law. Why do you seek to kill me?” (vv. 16-19) Jesus, when asked a question, always answered in a way that would educate those that would listen, these people had ears to hear, but they could not. (Isaiah 6:10, Jeremiah 5:21, Ezekiel 12:2, Matthew 13:15, Acts 28:27, Romans 11:8)

One of the things that has been perpetrated upon us is the perception that Jesus was a meek and mild and slightly effeminate man that just wanted to be your friend. Nothing could be further from the truth. Joshua 5:13-15 is an example of the pre-incarnate Christ, with a sword drawn, leading God’s people. Go Read It and disabuse yourselves of what has been pushed upon us, that of a mild Christ that just wants to love us and be our friend. He is our King and Savior!

Jesus never shied away from schooling those that confronted Him. He was never confrontational but the Truth is as hard as a brick wall when you run into it. And that’s all the Jews ever did, run into the Truth and it made them stupid. As evidenced by what comes next. The crowd shouted back to Him “You have a demon! Who is seeking to kill you?” (v. 20) This man cured many many people, (Luke 4:40) fed thousands (Mark 6:30-44, Matthew 15:32-39) and cast out demons, (Luke 4:35, Matthew 8:32) now they’re claiming He has a demon. Like I said, stupid, sin makes you stupid. Nehemiah 9 is where the people have returned from Babylon and they are repenting their sins. They recite a brief chronology of knowing God, rejecting God, being punished by God, repenting to God. Rinse and repeat. Read it, it is a short chapter and will give you a better understanding of these Jews and their stiff necks. We share in their stiff necked ways.

Jesus answered them, “I did one work, and you all marvel at it. Moses gave you circumcision (not that it is from Moses, but from the fathers), and you circumcise a man on the Sabbath. If on the Sabbath a man receives circumcision, so that the law of Moses may not be broken, are you angry with me because on the Sabbath I made a man’s whole body well? Do not judge by appearances, but judge with right judgment.” (v. 21-24) We should also pay attention to this lesson in this day and age. Do not judge by appearances. We base most of our judgement on looks. Even Samuel the High Priest was fooled when told to view Jesse’s sons. Samuel picked what he thought looked good, but no, God wanted somebody with a good heart, not tall and handsome. Read the story in 1 Samuel 16, it’s a good one. So, do not judge by appearances, but judge with right judgment.” (v. 24)

I think we are going to stop right here and let you read about young David being chosen in Samuel 16. Also think about how you judge things. And while you’re at it, read about how you should judge not lest you be judged. Judgement, in my opinion, is one of our major faults and sins. You can use these scriptures for study: Mat 7:1-5, Luke 6:37, Romans 2:1-2, James 4:11-12, Romans 14:10-13, Luke 6:41, 1 Corinthians 4:3-5, Romans 14:3-4, Ezekiel 16:52-56 Enjoy your time enriching your mind with God’s Words and reap the blessing of your obedience to Him.

For a more thorough unpacking of this portion of John 7, I enjoin you to watch this sermon by Ben Merkle. He does a very good job of explaining the scripture and you come away with a much better understanding of Christ and the unbelief of Him and His teachings in this part of the scripture. I count this as Providence that this sermon popped up in my YouTube feed while I was writing this. God is working in all of our lives, you just have to pause and recognize it, then pause again to praise and thank God for His work in you.

We are still in John 6 and we left off with verse 51: “I am the living bread that came down from heaven. If anyone eats of this bread, he will live forever. And the bread that I will give for the life of the world is my flesh.” This perplexed the creatures He was talking to. They knew Him as Jesus, son of Joseph and now this rabbi is telling them things, with such authority, (Matthew 7:29) it seemed incredulous. They were basing their knowledge of what they knew from what was being taught in the synagogues and those things imposed on them from the Pharisees. It is similar to today, where our Pastors teach us from the Bible, which is becoming much less of a given everyday, and our secular government imposes rules for living safely, trying hard to take the place of God and wanting the same trust and faith that God wants from us. Many of our church leaders seem fine with letting the government tell them what to do.

The Pharisees were mostly concerned with outward appearances and claiming Abraham as their father. They truly thought that being of that particular lineage plus all their rules, their ritual washing and tithings and fancy clothing made them a sure thing for Heaven. When confronted by Jesus and told that none of what they were doing was going to get them into heaven, they didn’t take it well. In fact, they plotted to kill God. (Matthew 12:14) When put that way it sounds strange, but that is the essence of it. They had invested their whole culture into living out their righteousness in laws they imposed, the rituals they enforced and the clothing and attitude they adopted. The people noticed this and you could say it rubbed off on them. And Jesus was never one to sugar coat the path to heaven. (Matthew 19:24). I think Ephesians 2:8-9 says it the way I like it best: For by grace are ye saved through faith; and that not of yourselves: it is the gift of God. By Grace through Faith. That passage is really what the Reformation was about. You are saved by Grace through Faith, by God, not by a religious body that claims it and it alone is the only authority for dispensing and interpreting the word of God. If you’ve lived under a rock for most of your life and don’t know what I’m talking about, it is the Catholics and their claims of such authority.

What Jesus was doing with Him saying “The bread I give you for the life of the world is my flesh” is known to us because we have the whole word of God, breathed out into the Bible. The Jews of that day were stiff necked and unwilling to believe what He told them. And Christ was not going to offer the “greasy grace” or better known as easy believism. They grumbled amongst themselves saying “How can this man give us his flesh to eat?” (v. 52)

To better understand where this negativity in His message came from, let us turn to Ellicott’s Commentary for English Readers written in 1897:
Some of them have spoken of eating His flesh. Others may even have pressed this to the reductio ad horribile. Eat His flesh! Shall we, then, drink His blood too? In no less than seven passages of the Pentateuch had the eating of blood been forbidden (Genesis 9:4; Leviticus 3:17; Leviticus 7:26-27; Leviticus 17:10-14; Leviticus 19:26; Deuteronomy 12:16; Deuteronomy 12:23-24; Deuteronomy 15:23); and we find in later times the strength of the feeling of abhorrence, as in 1Samuel 14:32, and Ezekiel 33:25, and in the decree of the first Judæo-Christian Council (Acts 15:29). In the fullest of these passages (Leviticus 17:10-14), the prohibition is grounded upon the facts that the blood is the physical seat of animal life, and that the blood maketh atonement for the soul. It was the life-element poured out before God instead of the life of the soul that sinned. Such would be the thoughts of those who strove among themselves as to what His words could mean; and to these thoughts He speaks with the “Verily, verily,” which ever expresses a spiritual truth that He alone could reveal.

Much of their law was wrapped up into what they could and could not eat. For the average Jew following Jesus around, for mostly entertainment purposes, they would fall back on what they thought they knew, which when you look at it in the whole, was not much.

Jesus told them “Truly, truly, I say to you, unless you eat the flesh of the Son of Man and drink his blood, you have no life in you. Whoever feeds on my flesh and drinks my blood has eternal life, and I will raise him up on the last day. For my flesh is true food, and my blood is true drink. Whoever feeds on my flesh and drinks my blood abides in me, and I in him. As the living Father sent me, and I live because of the Father, so whoever feeds on me, he also will live because of me. This is the bread that came down from heaven, not like the bread the fathers ate, and died. Whoever feeds on this bread will live forever.” Jesus said these things in the synagogue, as he taught at Capernaum. (vv. 53-59)

So what are we to make of Christ’s statements? From Matthew Henry’s Concise Commentary:
The flesh and blood of the Son of man, denote the Redeemer in the nature of man; Christ and him crucified, and the redemption wrought out by him, with all the precious benefits of redemption; pardon of sin, acceptance with God, the way to the throne of grace, the promises of the covenant, and eternal life. These are called the flesh and blood of Christ, because they are purchased by the breaking his body, and the shedding of his blood. Also, because they are meat and drink to our souls. Eating this flesh and drinking this blood mean believing in Christ. We partake of Christ and his benefits by faith. The soul that rightly knows its state and wants, finds whatever can calm the conscience, and promote true holiness, in the redeemer, God manifest in the flesh. Meditating upon the cross of Christ gives life to our repentance, love, and gratitude. We live by him, as our bodies live by our food. We live by him, as the members by the head, the branches by the root: because he lives we shall live also.

Just so you’d know, that chunk of text was originally written in 1706. He is one I go to quite often for understanding scripture. “We partake of Christ and his benefits by faith” Those Jews heard what they heard and recoiled at what Christ had said. Jesus knew their hearts would not believe, so He told them the truth of the matter, yet put it in a way that they would not understand. So that their ears would not hear and eyes not see. (Matthew 13:15)

It was not just the common Jew that was grumbling about Christ’s statements. The disciples were starting to get nervous:

When many of his disciples heard it, they said, “This is a hard saying; who can listen to it?” But Jesus, knowing in himself that his disciples were grumbling about this, said to them, “Do you take offense at this? Then what if you were to see the Son of Man ascending to where he was before? It is the Spirit who gives life; the flesh is no help at all. The words that I have spoken to you are spirit and life. But there are some of you who do not believe.” (For Jesus knew from the beginning who those were who did not believe, and who it was who would betray him.) And he said, “This is why I told you that no one can come to me unless it is granted him by the Father.” (vv. 60-65)

The message that we are granted to Christ, by the Father, is a strong one and throw in by Grace through Faith and you’ve got the entire understanding of your salvation, one granted by the Father, as a gift of grace. Square that with what the Pharisees did, works and looks and who you belonged to. The disciples had heard some of this before and this, as they said, was a hard message and one alien to the Jews way of thinking.

After this many of his disciples turned back and no longer walked with him. So Jesus said to the twelve, “Do you want to go away as well?” Simon Peter answered him, “Lord, to whom shall we go? You have the words of eternal life, and we have believed, and have come to know, that you are the Holy One of God.” (vv. 66-69) Jesus was culling those who He knew would not accept His message. We are also tested in our Faith. Who do you turn to when tested? Does your Faith waiver?

I have not known personally, a person who claimed to be a believer, and then turned away and never came back when things got challenging. This is what some of the disciples did, walk away when their rabbi started talking in such a harsh manner. It is a classic “Sower of the Seeds” parable. Their seeds had been cast into the weeds and when they were tested, they had no depth to their roots and their faith left them. Then Simon Peter speaks for the 12 and with some divine knowledge.

Jesus answered them, “Did I not choose you, the twelve? And yet one of you is a devil.” He spoke of Judas the son of Simon Iscariot, for he, one of the twelve, was going to betray him. (vv. 70-71)

So how does this apply to you? Christ is the Bread of Life. In fact, He is our only Hope. And that Hope brings Faith, granted by Grace, given to us by the Father. In your day to day life, do you feel that Hope? Is your Faith strong enough to withstand a test of it? Do you talk to your Father about your concerns? This should generate an interest in reading what our Father wanted us to read. How else will you know what God wants of us? Ponder on where your roots of Faith are planted. As I said before, if you have an interest in God, He’s already had an interest in you. The very Creator of the universe has an interest in you! Are you going to squander that because it’s not entertaining enough? “Let your laughter be turned into mourning, and your joy to gloom” (James 4:9). From MacArthur’s Devotionals:
Humor has always had a place in popular culture. But in recent decades a more worldly side to humor has emerged. Situation comedies dominate the list of top-rated TV shows, but many are far from what’s really best for people to view. The shows’ contents so often pander to the immoral and tend to put down scriptural values. Meanwhile, the world also runs headlong after activities that stress fun and self-indulgence. Most people just want to enjoy life and not take anything too seriously.

God’s Word acknowledges that there is a proper time and place for joy and laughter: “a time to weep, and a time to laugh; a time to mourn, and a time to dance” (Eccles. 3:4). The psalmist tells of one appropriate time for laughter and happiness: “When the Lord brought back the captive ones of Zion, we were like those who dream. Then our mouth was filled with laughter, and our tongue with joyful shouting” (Ps. 126:1-2).

But the Lord requires that anyone who would have a relationship with Him must begin on a sober, serious, humble note. In today’s Scripture, James urges sinners to exchange worldly laughter and frivolity for godly mourning and gloom over their sin. The laughter spoken of here is the kind that indicates a leisurely indulging in human desires and pleasures. It pictures people who give no serious thought to God, to life, death, sin, judgment, or God’s demands for holiness. Without mincing words, it is the laughter of fools who reject God, not that of the humble who pursue Him.

James’s message is that saving faith and proper humility consist of a serious, heartfelt separation from the folly of worldliness as well as a genuine sorrow over sin. If these characteristics are present in your life, it is fairly safe evidence that you are one of the humble (see 1 John 2:15-17).

So you see, God takes our salvation seriously, so seriously that He sent His Son to die on a cross and be raised again, all for us that would believe. I would ask that you would approach your salvation with the same intent. Don’t sit back and let your Life in Christ pass you by.