Standing Firm

Psalm 38:19-22                       Acts 26:9-11                         John 9:8-34

Standing Firm

On April 18, 1521, a single monk from an obscure town in Germany stood in the midst of a hall crowded with religious intelligentsia assembled before the most powerful man in Europe at the time. He was asked whether he would defend the books and tracts he had written or withdraw them in whole or in part. In a speech that shook the religious world, the monk ended with the following statement:

“Unless I am convinced by the testimony of the Scriptures or by clear reason (for I do not trust either in the pope or in the councils alone, since it is well known that they have often erred and contradicted themselves), I am bound by the Scriptures I have quoted, and my conscience is captive to the Word of God. I cannot and I will not recant anything since it is neither safe nor right to go against conscience. Here I stand; I cannot do otherwise. So help me God.”

These bold and uncompromising words caused quite a pandemonium, as can be expected…but Martin Luther held to his convictions despite ridicule and threats.

The healing of the blind man should have brought unfettered joy from all who knew him. Instead, his joy was turned into a nightmare as person after person interrogated him and doubted his word.

This man would have been well known to all who frequented the temple precincts, but the change in him was so radical that many were confused as to his identity. Often such confusion arises when God performs a great work of change in the life of an individual. The confusion might be due to the absolute thrill of beholding a miracle of God…the changing of something thought so imponderable that it was not even considered a vague probability until it suddenly became a reality…but here, in the case of this man born blind, it seems the confusion appears to have been one of unbelief. 

“Isn’t this the same man who used to sit and beg?” they asked sceptically. Some claimed he was, but others said it was someone who just looked like him. Can you hear the unbelief here? “Nah, that’s just not possible…it can’t be him.” 

And when he insisted that he was the same man, they demanded to know how his eyes were opened. But even after he told them, they still could not, or perhaps would not believe him and so they swept him off to the Jewish leaders for professional verification. No joy here…no rejoicing in another’s good fortune.

Sometimes a life dominated by frustration or hard knocks can make one super cynical. So, when something good happens to someone else, but not to you, doubt or even distrust prevents you from responding appropriately. And certainly, life was hard for many living in Jerusalem during the First Century. 

So, the crowd escorted the healed man to the Pharisees and once again, we are confronted with a blindness far worse than the physical disability. 

In some respects, the Gospel of John can be likened to a good slow-drip coffee percolator. If you recall, it was shortly after the Feast of Tabernacles…a Feast during which water was drawn from the Pool of Siloam and poured out on and around the altar in anticipation of a good rainy season and consequently a good harvest…it was shortly after this Feast that Jesus revealed himself to be the Light of the World. “I AM the light of the world,” he said. “Whoever follows me will never walk in darkness but have the light of life.” And, if you recall, there were some who believed in Jesus and there were some who did not…in fact, they were downright hostile. 

Now, in this record of the healing of the man born blind, we once more read about Jesus being the Light of the world…and we also read about the Pool of Siloam where the man washed the clay off his eyes, his subsequent belief in Jesus, as well as the hostile refusal of those who did not believe in Jesus. 

So, it is almost as if John was trying to show us that Jesus would say something profound (like “I am the light of the world, those who follow me will not walk in darkness”) and then he would let it percolate for a while. And then he would repeat what he had said, but in an acted parabolic manner, as we see here, with a man who had been living in darkness suddenly seeing the light both physically and spiritually. A good slow-drip percolator type teaching.

Now, one would think that the restoration of the blind man’s sight would have broken open even the hardest of hearts, but, instead, the hearts of the leaders remained impenetrable. The main reason for this, John tells us, was that Jesus performed this miracle on the Sabbath. One of the 39 Melakhot (thirty-nine categories of work which the oral law identified as forbidden on the Sabbath) prohibited the combining of “solid and liquid together to form a paste or dough-like substance” (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/39_Melakhot). Remember, Jesus made clay by mixing dirt (a solid) with his spittle (liquid) and he applied the mixture (a paste or dough-like substance) to the man’s eyes. This act would have been considered a prohibited work on the Sabbath. 

So, the question is, why did Jesus use spittle and dirt? He could have simply spoken, and the man would have been healed. Was this intended to provoke the Pharisees by exposing the preposterousness of their hair-splitting minutiae? Was it perhaps an image of recreation using the ground to “remake” a man? Was it a validation of the use of poultices or medicine in curing people? I don’t know. 

But my gut feeling would be that he wanted to point out the blind and oppressive enslavement of God’s liberated people through the multiplication of prohibitions. While God does certainly want his children to follow his law for their own good, some had and still some have taken it upon themselves to abstract the law from its original context and isolate it from the God who commanded it, producing a set of extrabiblical rules and regulations that seek to control and manipulate people. That drains the law of its relational content. We do what God commands because we love him. Living in abject fear of whether or not we may tie our shoelaces on a Sunday robs us of the kind of relationship encouraged in Scripture. 

Nevertheless, it was because they believed that Jesus had broken the Sabbath in his healing of the man born blind that these leaders called into question the spiritual allegiance of Jesus. Here’s another one of those wonderful slow-drip percolations of John. Remember, we dealt with Jesus' teaching on his origin versus the origin of those who did not believe in him in the previous chapter. So here once again we are confronted with the question: Was Jesus from God or not? 

The healing of the man born blind created an immediate dilemma for these leaders. Jesus broke their law; therefore, he must be a sinner. But how could a sinner perform such a miracle? The healed man’s later questions are really a reflection of their own inner struggles…but, interestingly enough, they arrived at vastly different conclusions. 

The interrogation began simply enough: How did this happen? So, the blind man repeated his story to the leaders. Now, it is important to realise that there is a shift in the story here…it is at this point that the great comparison between physical and spiritual blindness began. The leaders were themselves divided on how to explain what had happened and consequently, they found it impossible to reach a consensus.

And so, they, the judges, asked the man, the witness in this case, to pronounce the judgment! “What have you to say about him? It was your eyes he opened.” Instead of admitting that their thinking was faulty, these so-called teachers of the law wanted the one healed to condemn his healer. But the healed man could not simply brush aside the miracle…after all, for him, this was not a theoretical abstraction…it was very much concrete. 

Now, what he meant by calling Jesus a prophet is not clear. Did he mean that Jesus was someone like Elijah or Elisha both of whom performed amazing miracles, or did he mean that Jesus was a messianic figure…the Prophet to come who would be like Moses? My gut feeling here is that as his understanding was progressive (because it is only later in the chapter that he comes to believe in Jesus as the Son of Man) he must have thought more along the lines of the former…that Jesus was a prophet like Elijah or Elisha. 

Of course, his reply did not satisfy the Pharisees. Perhaps they suspected that the man might be in collusion with Jesus like so many unscrupulous people have been throughout history, claiming that they have been healed or resurrected by a self-proclaimed prophet or apostle or even a messiah, for a substantial fee of course. 

But even so, agreeing with the man’s conclusion at this point (that Jesus was a prophet) would have been the same as admitting that their theologizing was wrong. Either the healer was a sinner, or they had to rethink their extrabiblical rules for work on the Sabbath.

So, they called in the man’s own parents. Their question to the parents appears to have been a veiled threat, as the parents only answered it in part. “We know he is our son,” they replied, “and we know he was born blind. But how he can see now, or who opened his eyes, we don’t know.” 

And then they passed the buck right back to their son. “Ask him. He is of age (which means he was older than 13 or 14); he will speak for himself.” The cost of confrontation was too high for the parents and so they turned away from an opportunity to defend both Jesus and their son, and consequently, they failed to glorify God.

It is sad that people could be so afraid of their spiritual leaders, don’t you think? It is easy for us to judge the parents for being faint-hearted, but what kind of religious institution generates such fear?

Nevertheless, any thought of possible collusion was exploded by the parent’s testimony. The miracle was real…no doubt about that…which only goes to prove once again that even remarkable wonders do not necessarily produce faith. 

So, the healed man was once again left standing alone. Just like Martin Luther, he was called upon to testify against his own conscience and his own better judgment. The statement in verse 24 is in the form of an oath. “Give God the glory! We know that this man is a sinner.” Now, this sounds a lot like an oath uttered by Joshua at the judgement of Achan in Joshua 7:19. “My son,” Joshua said to Achan, “I beg you, give glory to the Lord God of Israel, and make confession to him, and tell me what you have done; do not hide it from me.” 

While this healed man can hardly be compared with Achan, the Pharisees may have wanted him to confess his role in encouraging someone considered a ‘deceiver’ by allowing him to heal him. So, in other words, they would have viewed this man as being involved in an activity that they considered unlawful or morally wrong. The charge then would be one of complicity or collaboration. 

Ironically then, what the Pharisees were expecting of this healed man, was for him to condone and uphold their insincere conclusion by denying what he knew to be true. But for him this was impossible. “Whether he is a sinner or not,” he replied, “I do not know. But one thing I do know. I was blind…but now I see.” 

And with this very simple statement, he exposed the ridiculous nature of the whole deliberation. Clearly, something amazing had happened that did not fit into any of their theological categories. But they were so well-entrenched in their rigid regulatory religion, that they could not acknowledge an act of God…even one as incredible as this.

Just as an aside, there may be a comparative contrast here between this healed man and the man healed at the pool of Bethesda in chapter 5. Both were healed on the Sabbath, both were instructed to do something (pick up your sleeping mat, wash in the Pool of Siloam), both were interrogated by the Pharisees, and neither of them asked to be healed…but the one “betrayed” Jesus while the other “defended” him. 

But to get back to this story, the Pharisees began interrogating him all over again. “What did he do to you? How did he open your eyes?” 

At this point, things got rather humorous. The healed man became the interrogator and questioner. “I have told you already and you did not listen. Why do you want to hear it again?” And perhaps there was a hint of sarcasm in his voice when he asked, “Do you want to become his disciples too?” Interestingly, the word “too” or “also” may indicate that he already considered himself to be a disciple of Jesus. 

Be that as it may, the Pharisees found themselves in a corner with only two possible options open to them. Either defeat or defence…and their defence was to yell at him and insult him. “You are this fellow’s disciple! We are disciples of Moses! We know that God spoke to Moses, but as for this fellow, we don’t even know where he comes from!”

There is an interesting parallel here to when Jesus asked them if John the Baptist’s baptism was from heaven or not in Luke 20:4. They discussed the question among themselves and said, “If we say, ‘From heaven’, then he will ask, ‘Why didn’t you believe him?’ But if we say, ‘From men’, all the people will stone us, because they are persuaded that John was a prophet.” And so, they answered, “We don’t know where it was from.”

By stating that they did not know where Jesus was from (in other words, whether he was from God or not), they were, in one sense, admitting their inconclusive judgment. Their defence was ignorance (“we don’t know where he is from”),  but ignorance is easily remedied by investigation…something these interrogators apparently failed to do. Ironically, by confessing their lack of knowledge about Jesus here, they contradicted their own previous claim in verse 24 where they claimed to ‘know’ that he was a sinner.

It is interesting to note that while just about every character in this passage maintained repeatedly that they either knew something or did not know something, here at the climax of this bizarre interrogation, the Pharisees, who were reputed to know the law, claimed to know nothing. 

At this point, the healed man’s boldness rose to the occasion. “You utter an absurdity,” he said. “You say you don’t know whether this man is from God or not, but he has done what is considered impossible…he has opened my eyes…a man who was born blind! The Scriptures clearly teach that God does not hear sinners, but only godly men who do his will (Psalm 34:15; Proverbs 15:8, 29; 21:27; 28:9). If my healer was not from God, he would not have been able to do this miracle.” 

What happened next was a gross violation of their own rules for interrogation, but this is the kind of behaviour one expects from those who refuse to confess their own errors. Being unable to refute the perfect logic of the healed man’s defence and being unwilling to withdraw from their moral high ground, they excommunicated him from the synagogue. 

“Excommunication was one of the severest forms of discipline administered by a synagogue community and was apparently rare and thus very harsh in the time of Jesus.” (Keener, Craig S.. The IVP Bible Background Commentary: New Testament (IVP Bible Background Commentary Set) (p. 277). InterVarsity Press. Kindle Edition.) But when you cannot win on your own terms, walk out, or kick out.

It is possible that at the time this Gospel was written, many of those who were reading it “had faced the danger or reality of expulsion from their synagogues (16:2; cf. 12:42-43). The faithfulness of this man (in contrast to the betrayal of the man in 5:14-16) would (have encourage(d) them to remain faithful too.” (Keener, 277)

Like this healed man, who once was blind but now could see, Martin Luther was excommunicated. Other reformers were excommunicated too and executed by fire or by axe. Their bold stand for the truth cost them dearly. The religious institutions of their day turned on them like ravenous wolves. Nevertheless, they remained faithful and true to God’s Word.

There comes a time in the life of every follower of Jesus when we have to make a choice to either stand with him or to betray him. When we come to these crossroads, we are faced with the same options as all those involved in this passage about the healing of the blind man. If we feel incompetent to deal with the situation on our own, we can seek counsel from those who should be able to help us. But ultimately, as Martin Luther so clearly stated, the only trustworthy instrument to which we have ready access is the Word of God. It is the only firm foundation we have to stand on that will prevent us from either capitulating under pressure or from embracing error. May God, in his mercy, keep us at all times in humble submission to his Word.

Shall we pray?

© Johannes W H van der Bijl 2023

Man’s Perceptions of God’s Intentions

Psalm 51:1-6                     Revelation 21:1-7                           John 9:1-7

Man’s Perceptions of God’s Intentions

A story is told about a man working in a field one day. Suddenly he saw someone running towards him screaming hysterically, “Richard! Richard! Come quickly! Your house is burning down!” The man dropped all his tools and ran as fast as his legs would carry him. And then suddenly he stopped. “What’s wrong with me?” he said out loud. “My name isn’t Richard, and I don’t have a house.” 

The disciples of Jesus sometimes remind me of this man. They just didn’t stop to think things through before reacting. “Who sinned,” they asked. “This man or his parents, that he was born blind?” Knee-jerk reactions often tend to end in embarrassment and retractions or, unfortunately, irreparable relational damage. It is safer and wiser to wait until you have evaluated all possible angles before opening your mouth or posting your thoughts on any social media platform, for that matter. 

Now, there are several things that are very interesting in this passage. The first is the assumption that personal sin was the only possible cause of this man’s disability. 

John tells us that this man had been blind from birth. Their question was who sinned…the man himself or his parents?  At this point, we must ask ourselves what their understanding of this man’s sin would have been. Did they believe that an unborn child might sin? Or did they think that is affliction was a form of punishment in anticipation of a later sin? 

It was a common belief at that time that all diseases and disabilities arose from personal sin. This can be seen, for instance, in the rabbinic saying "There is no death without sin and there is no suffering without iniquity" (Shabbat 55a.17). In other words, the Rabbis taught that there was a direct relationship between a person’s sinful actions and the punishments meted out against him. 

This belief presents us with only two possible options. The first is that the parents' sin was responsible. This position could be justified by citing Exodus 20:5, “I, the Lord your God, am a jealous God, punishing the children for the sins of the fathers to the third and fourth generations of those who hate me.”  However, this seems to be referring to an active generational sin (the grammatical form used here [Qal active participle] most often expresses continuous action, i.e., those who are hating me). But this commandment may have been used to defend the idea of personal parental sin being visited upon the children because God appeared to correct an erroneous generalisation later in Ezekiel 18:20 where he clearly stated, “The soul who sins is the one who will die. The son will not share the guilt of the father, nor will the father share the guilt of the son.” 

Now, the other possible justification for this option is the story of David’s adultery with Bathsheba and the murder of her husband, Uriah. The child conceived in this sinful act died while David and Bathsheba lived. However, it is not prudent to apply a single case universally, especially since God’s words to Ezekiel appear to advise against such a broad generalisation, so I think we can safely move away from this option – that the parent’s sin was the cause of the child’s disability. 

The second option is that the man himself had somehow sinned before birth. Whether this was possible or not was a matter of rabbinic debate. Some rabbis thought it possible, while others thought it impossible. For example, in Bereshit Rabbah 63:6, Rabbi Yohanan, commenting on the story of Jacob and Esau, interpreted the words "struggled together in the womb” as " this one ran to kill that one and that one ran to kill this one.". In other words, he believed that the babies tried to murder each other in the womb. However, even though it’s not clear how widely held the prenatal sin view was, apparently it was widely held enough to generate deliberation…and this idea may be what the disciples had in mind when they asked the question…but there is no Scriptural support for such a view. 

And I could not find any indication that people believed in retroactive punishment…in other words, that his being born blind was a result of a sin he had yet to commit. But I may be wrong…

However, I want us to stop and think for a moment about the indescribable grief that this type of thinking can inflict upon parents of special-needs children. Imagine, if you will, a parent, or a special-needs child for that matter, who is already struggling with the reality of their situation, suddenly being confronted by someone who suggests that they may be directly responsible for the given condition. People are not abstract theories that can be debated without consequence. There may well be cases where the sinful actions of the parents (such as drug abuse, alcohol abuse, sexual promiscuity, or involvement in the occult) may have had a direct negative impact on the child, but it is not for us, as believers in a forgiving God, to speculate or to accuse. Rather, this kind of suffering ought to be met with the same kind of compassion seen in the actions of Jesus when confronted with misery and pain. 

Be that as it may, in his reply to the disciple’s question, both the man and his parents were exonerated by Jesus, but, interestingly, as the story unfolded, the two parties chose different paths forward. The healed man became a courageous witness to the truth and later became a believer in Jesus, whereas his parents became terrified capitulators as they surrendered to a fear of being excommunicated from the synagogue…a not-so-irrational fear, by the way, when we see later that this is exactly what the Pharisees did to their healed son.

But Jesus’ reply to the disciples raises a number of interesting questions regarding suffering. Jesus didn’t really provide them (or us) with a reason for the disability or the source of the suffering. He simply indicated that suffering, or in this case disability, may serve to further the work of God in the world.  

There may be a faint echo here of what Joseph said to his brothers in Genesis 50:20. “You intended to harm me, but God intended it for good to accomplish what is now being done, the saving of many lives.” But there isn’t really a direct connection between these two stories because what the brothers did was definitely sinful. Perhaps what the Apostle Paul said later in Romans 8:28 is a better link: “And we know that in all things God works for the good of those who love him, who have been called according to his purpose.”

So, I think it is safe to say at this point, that while personal sin may be a cause for suffering, not all suffering is necessarily caused by personal sin. 

Now, having said this, I do believe that because of the sin of Adam and Eve, suffering entered the world…therefore suffering is linked to sin, or rather to what is known as “original sin”. The perfect world created by God was broken at the time of the Fall, and so we live amid that brokenness…and suffering is part and parcel of that brokenness. But with the death of the obedient, sinless second Adam (Jesus), this situation is reversed for those who by faith move from being in the first Adam to being in the second Adam. 

And as Jesus is in the process of making all things new, a time will come when there will be no more death or mourning or crying or pain (Revelation 21:4). We see glimpses of this future reality whenever people are miraculously healed like this man born blind…or when people are given the grace to use their suffering for God’s glory because they have come to understand that as we presently live this earthly life in the context of the historical calamity brought about by the disobedience of our first ancestors, we remain subject to suffering. Joni Eareckson Tada is probably the best modern-day example of someone who has used disability, in her case quadriplegia, for immeasurable good. 

Regardless of the situation(s) we may have to face in life, we must always remember that as long as it is day…as long as there is life…Jesus continues to work, and his work is always good in spite of the perception of humanity. The presence of Jesus is light, and we are told in John 1 that his light overcomes the darkness…a recreation image mirroring the 1st day of the 1st Creation.

Now, I cannot explain suffering…I wish I could. In our line of work, Louise and I have witnessed the most unbelievable pain and unimaginable misery. But closer to home, our own son has special-needs children. Believe me, I have asked all the questions there are to ask…I have prayed all the prayers…I have even blamed myself. But this story of the man born blind teaches me that my thoughts are not God’s thoughts…my perceptions cannot come close to revealing God’s intentions…intentions that we have already seen are always good. 

And so I surrender to what the Scriptures reveal about the God I profess to believe in…his infinity (that there is no beginning or end to him), his omnipotence (that he is almighty and that nothing is impossible for him), his immutability (that he cannot and will not change), his omniscience (that he knows all things), his omnipresence (that he is everywhere and consequently we are never alone), his holiness, his wisdom, his faithfulness, his justness, his righteousness, his mercifulness, his kindness, his compassion, his goodness, his graciousness, his lovingkindness, and his gloriousness. When I face what I cannot explain, I choose to focus on what I know about God, and I leave the inexplicable in his hands.

A little spittle and clay…a quick wash at the Pool of Siloam (a word, John tells us that means “sent”) …the same pool, by the way, from which water was drawn during the celebration of the Festival of Booths where Jesus revealed himself to be the Light of the World (John 8:12) …a little spittle and clay, a quick wash, and the man born blind came home seeing. But, as we shall see later, this healing was only the beginning. This man, sent to the pool of “sent” by the one who was sent into the world to reveal the Father, became the one sent to display the work of God in his life.

As the story unfolds, the physical blindness of this man becomes a metaphor for spiritual blindness, and the charge of sin, at first laid at the door of the man and his parents, is shown to be the reality of us all…because, dearest beloved brethren, we all have sinned, and we all fall short of the glory of God. We are all deprived of the light of life and it is only in Jesus that spiritual sight can be restored. 

This man, born and raised in darkness, served to reveal Jesus as the Light of the world, but he also served to expose the collective sinful state of humankind. The disciple’s evaluation of his condition was that he or his parents must have sinned…an evaluation that did not seem to take into consideration the sinfulness of us all. Jesus pointed out that neither evaluation was correct, declaring that this man’s affliction was so that the works of God should be revealed in and through him. This should caution anyone when tempted to pronounce judgment on another’s suffering…or upon our own trials and tribulations…as it teaches us that God often does his best work in the fiercest of flames. 

Your present difficulties or the difficulties of those around you may not be an indication of God’s displeasure. Adversity may not be the enemy we think it is. Indeed, if it draws us closer to our Lord, it may be the greatest friend we have. 

And so, this is the challenge I wish to leave with you today. We have all met Jesus. At some stage in our lives, he came and revealed himself to us, and we believed in him. Last week we heard how he brought one of our own to himself in Jody’s testimony. But it is what we do with this meeting…it is what we do with this revelation that matters. Jesus often chooses to use our suffering as a witness to those who are blind to his goodness. It is when we testify that we will still believe the truth even if he does not deliver us from whatever fiery furnace we may face…it is when we declare that we will not deny him even if we should die…it is at that moment that their eyes are opened to the reality of a God who transcends the suffering of this world and who alone makes sense of it. They may choose to shut their eyes, to be sure, but they can never say that they did not see.

Do not hide from your weakness as it is in your weakness that his strength is revealed. “Not only that,” the Apostle Paul tells us, “but we rejoice in our sufferings, knowing that suffering produces endurance, and endurance produces character, and character produces hope, and hope does not put us to shame, because God's love has been poured into our hearts through the Holy Spirit who has been given to us.” Romans 5:3-5

Shall we pray?

© Johannes W H van der Bijl 2023

Stagnation or Transformation?

Romans 12:1-2                          Philippians 2:5-11                        John 8:48-59

Stagnation or Transformation?

I know that there have always been many angry people in the world…ever since Adam blamed Eve and Eve blamed the serpent, people have been mad at each other. It’s no surprise then to read that the very first son of our collective ancestors killed his brother. Anger plus the blame game always spirals into violent behaviour. 

Now, perhaps it is because of the media or because there are so many more people in the world today, but it just seems as if a kind of irrational anger has become the new norm in society…anger ranging from a simmering sense of having been offended to a resentful dissatisfaction to picketing to protesting to boycotting to rioting to vandalising and, ultimately, to killing. 

And just by the way, you can do all those things figuratively too…just think about it. 

Although most folks have different reasons for being angry, they all tend to share a sense of justification for their resentment. This is one of the reasons people fail to deal rationally with their anger. If you believe you are right to be angry, then you cannot let it go even when confronted with the truth. 

Of course, not all anger is wrong…there is a time when we ought to be angry about how people abuse creation and their fellow creatures…but the kind of anger I'm talking about is an anger born out of a sense of entitlement. This is an anger that is often emotional, unreasonable, and lacking in any form of logic. It is an anger that is wielded as a weapon of self-determination and self-preservation. Letting go of this type of anger is equivalent to eroding the very foundation of the angry person’s existence. To admit that their anger is unfounded would be to admit that their perspective on life is groundless. 

People generally get angry when they believe their perceived truth has been violated in some or other way, and this causes them to feel personally wronged. When this happens, we have one of two options in dealing with the anger. The first is to stop, listen and evaluate the other position without interruption, and then to sensibly decide which of the two positions holds up to reason and logic. Of course, sometimes the conclusion may be that both positions appear to be equally valid and therefore any negative response is not appropriate, but nevertheless, this option is a rational and reasoned reaction to a difference of opinion. 

The second option is to stubbornly refuse to budge regardless of how many well-structured arguments for the alternative view are given. At this point, the only choices open to you would be to attack your perceived opponent or to play the martyr. 

Those arguing with Jesus in the Temple in John 8 seem to have selected the second of the two options and they decided to attack. They had just received consistently coherent counter-responses from Jesus – responses peppered with quotations and allusions to the Scriptures – but because they clung to their traditional understanding and their traditional interpretation of the Scriptures, they failed to comprehend the truth. And, as they were not about to back down and play the martyr, they chose to attack.

Now, in order to understand the reaction of these folks in our Gospel passage, you need to recall the events immediately prior to this concluding confrontation. Jesus had just exposed their unbelieving hearts through a masterful process of reasoning. If they were children of Abraham as they claimed, then they would have acted like Abraham. If God was their Father, then they would have heard his voice through his Son. As it were, their behaviour showed that they were neither children of Abraham nor of God…rather, their behaviour mirrored that of the father of lies, the devil himself. Behaviour reveals belief…you can only act out of what you think is right and true.

Now, I might be wrong, but other than those dabbling in the occult, very few people take kindly to being called children of the devil, especially if they believe themselves to be the exact opposite. These folks in the temple were no exception, but what appears to have intensified their anger is the fact that they lacked a satisfactory response to these accusations. 

Their only recourse was to resort to throwing the accusation back at him with brass knobs on. “Aren’t we right in saying you are a Samaritan and demon-possessed?” Now, assuming that they were speaking Aramaic to each other at the time, it is possible that the word rendered “Samaritan” in Greek here would have been one of two Aramaic words used for a Samaritan that could also mean either ‘heretic’ or ‘child of the devil’.  Either way, in any sense, literally or figuratively, calling someone a Samaritan was the ultimate insult for any 1st-century Jew. 

Whichever way we look at the slanderous statement, it meant that they considered Jesus to be a person of impure faith and therefore of illegitimate heritage. Of course, this was designed to counter his assertion that they were not children of Abraham or of God, but what strikes one as strange about their insults is the lack of connection with what had just transpired. 

They had not even attempted to refute the outcome of the previous section of the debate. It would have been better for them to have evaluated his assertions regarding the difference between their behaviour and that of Abraham…or to have evaluated Jesus’ words and works according to Scripture. But they did neither…and when no logical response is possible, the only other option is to resort to mockery and ridicule. 

Now, you might recall that this was not the only time Jesus was accused of being demon-possessed. In Matthew 12:24 the Pharisees said that he cast out demons by the prince of demons. The tragic irony of that statement is that the exact opposite was true…Jesus cast out demons by the Holy Spirit of God. To be so blind as to mistake the Holy Spirit for the devil is blind indeed. This is why the only unforgivable sin is the sin against the Holy Spirit. The Holy Spirit reveals reality, so if we mistake him for the devil, how can we ever possibly know the truth? 

And so, Jesus cautions them not to dishonour him because by his life – his words and his works – Jesus brought honour to the Father. He had just challenged them to convict him openly of a sin that would stick, and they could not. The basic premise of his discourse was that a tree is known by its fruit. His entire life was a testimony to the truth – to surrender and obedience to the Father. 

In Philippians 2:5-8 Paul, in an attempt to encourage the believers in Philippi to be more Christlike, said, “You must have the same attitude that Christ Jesus had. Though he was God, he did not think of equality with God as something to cling to (or to take advantage of). Instead, he gave up his divine privileges; he took the humble position of a slave and was born as a human being. When he appeared in human form, he humbled himself in obedience to God and died a criminal’s death on a cross.” (NLT) 

From conception to ascension, Jesus’ life demonstrated a consistent obedient submission to the Father. If they could not see that, then they could not possibly know the Father… it's really as simple as that. Their actions and their accusations exposed their real nature and as this debate continued, they progressively displayed their incomprehension, and their inability to counter the increasing conviction led them to the final and only option left…a rising violent anger.

But Jesus was not done yet. In verse 51 he said, “Very truly I tell you, whoever obeys my word, will never see death.” This statement is at once a comfort to those who have ears to hear as well as a challenge to those who do not. This is an echo of several statements from the Old Testament regarding obedience to God’s decrees and his laws. Those who obeyed his Word would live. (See for example Ezekiel 20:11, 13, 21) 

Obediently abiding and persevering in obedience to God’s Word is the only assurance we will ever have of eternal security. Those who endure to the end are saved from eternity to eternity. Whoever keeps God’s Word…walks in God’s Word…consistently obeys God’s Word…they will never see death. Of course, the opposite is just as true. He who does not keep God’s Word will see death…that much, these folks seemed to have understood.

And so, in verse 52, they hit back with an argument that seems to be a literal fusion of what Jesus said about Abraham’s obedience in verses 39-41 and then what he said about eternal life as a result of obedience here in verse 51. If Abraham was faithful in keeping God’s Word and if obedience to God’s Word resulted in eternal life, then, he ought not to have died. Yet it was obvious that neither he nor the prophets were still alive. That’s the gist of their reasoning. 

Now, of course, this is a ridiculously childish argument, but then again angry people often do not think rationally. Their rage at being stumped over and over again blinded them to all logic and consequently, the angry rhetoric that spews forth from their mouths is simply devoid of any reasonable sense. Of course, some folks just keep saying ludicrous things…and they keep pleading a lack of understanding of what is obvious…and they do so long enough to convince themselves that they are right. 

So, at this point, Jesus threw down the gauntlet, so to speak. This was a challenge of perceptions. They somehow perceived him to be dishonouring the Father by claiming to be greater than the Patriarch and so they were offended.  In other words, they were accusing him of self-exaltation. But their perception was faulty. Jesus was not asserting himself in making his claims. Rather his claims were based on his obedient fulfilment of what his Father had sent him to do. If he denied this connection between him and the Father, he would be false and a liar like them. 

As for their claim to covenantal inclusion through Abraham, Jesus once more exposed the difference between their attitude and Abraham’s attitude. They dishonoured him while Abraham, on the other hand, rejoiced at the prospect of the fulfilment of God’s promise. Because he believed so explicitly, Abraham knew that the promise of global blessing would be realised one day…this kind of faith is just as good as seeing. But unfortunately, when Jesus added, “he saw it and was glad”, they assumed that he meant his day and the days of Abraham were concurrent. Again, an overly literal interpretation of what was said here. 

But instead of responding to their absurd literal interpretation, Jesus blew their whole argument apart by revealing his eternal existence as the great I AM. “Before Abraham was,” he said, “I AM.”  There was no way they could not understand this blatant claim to divinity. This was the name God revealed to Moses when he called him to lead his people out of slavery in Egypt. 

And here the rising river of rage burst its banks. No more words. No more debate. They picked up stones (which would have been in abundant supply as the Temple was still under construction) to stone him. 

You see when you can’t win an argument despite bombastic rhetoric or dismissive slander, and when you are unwilling to concede, well then, the only remaining option is to silence your opponent. But, as his time had not yet come, they failed to do so as he simply slipped away from the Temple grounds.

 To each successive generation, as with our present generation, Jesus still comes as the light of the world, the bread of life, and as the great I AM. Like the Jews in this Gospel passage, we too have choices to make…yes, even those of us who claim to know him…after all, they claimed to know him too. 

Brennan Manning once said: “The greatest single cause of atheism in the world today is Christians who acknowledge Jesus with their lips and walk out the door and deny Him by their lifestyle. That is what an unbelieving world simply finds unbelievable.” 

If we claim to be followers of Jesus, do we do the works of Jesus? Do we hold to His Word? Do we know the truth? Do we trust the truth? When people look at us, do they see Jesus? Do they see the same kind of obedient submission to the Father? Or do they see a sanitized or maybe even not-so-sanitised version of themselves? There’s just no attraction in that…

As we come to participate in the meal that serves to remind us of the selfless sacrifice of Jesus, let us consider the words of Paul: “Therefore I urge you, brothers and sisters, in view of God’s mercy, to offer your bodies as a living sacrifice, holy and pleasing to God – this is your true and proper worship. Do not conform to the pattern of this world but be transformed by the renewing of your mind. Then you will be able to test and approve what God’s will is – his good, pleasing, and perfect will.” 

Shall we pray?

© Johannes W H van der Bijl 2023