A HARMONY OF THE GOSPELS

DDD. Christ’s Credibility Verified By His Foes’ Actions

(John 7:25-36)

I. Introduction

A. Between the fall Feast of Tabernacles and the winter Feast of Dedication (later Hanukkah), Jesus had one last opportunity to evangelize Judea before His crucifixion the next spring. (J. Dwight Pentecost, The Words and Works of Jesus Christ, 1991, p. 275) His conflict with Jerusalem’s religious authorities was now an open fact.

B. John 7:25-36 records how Christ’s credibility was challenged at the Feast of Tabernacles, and how it was verified even by His foes’ actions. We view the passage for our insight, application and edification:

II. Christ’s Credibility Verified By His Foes’ Actions, John 7:25-36.

A. In John 7:25-26, Israel’s religious leaders failed to arrest and kill Jesus though He spoke boldly in the temple without a reaction from the leaders even though the people there knew that their leaders wanted to kill Him:

1. Some of the people spoke up, asking if Jesus was the One Whom the religious leaders sought to kill, and yet though He was speaking boldly in the temple at the well-attended Feast of Tabernacles, the leaders were not even saying anything to Him, not to mention their not even arresting Him, John 7:25-26a.

2. This failure of the religious leaders even to say anything to Jesus at His public teaching in the temple in spite of their desire to kill Him caused some people to wonder if the leaders had come to trust in Him as the Messiah, John 7:26b. (J. Dwight Pentecost, The Words and Works of Jesus Christ, 1991, p. 277-278)

B. In John 7:27-30, even when Jesus openly taught that He had come from God the Father, what caused the religious leaders then to make the effort to arrest Him, no one even laid hands on Him:

1. Some of the people in the crowd objected to the idea that Jesus would be the Messiah, for they knew He was from Nazareth in Galilee, what contradicted a popular belief at the time that the Messiah would “be a man of mystery, coming out of nowhere.” (John 7:27; Ryrie Study Bible, KJV, 1978, ftn. to John 7:27)

2. Jesus reacted to this statement of the people by crying out publicly in the temple that though the people knew Him and from where He had come in Nazareth of Galilee, He had not come of His own authority, but that He had been sent by One Who was true and Whom the people did not know, John 7:28-29. He thus spoke of His being sent by God the Father though He had grown up in Nazareth of Galilee.

3. Realizing from this statement that Jesus was publicly claiming to have come from God, the religious leaders then tried to arrest Jesus, but no one even touched Him, John 7:30a. John explained that the cause for this failure to arrest Jesus was the fact that it was not His time to be arrested and slain, John 7:30b. The obvious force of God was hindering the religious leaders from doing that they had intended to do to Jesus!

C. In John 7:31-36, when many of the people began to believe in Jesus due to His John 7:28-29 claims of coming from the Father, a third and more potent effort by the leaders to arrest Jesus was thwarted by the distraction of the content of Jesus’ teaching itself:

1. Many people in the temple crowd eventually began to believe that Jesus was a messenger from God, and they asked that when the Messiah came, would he do more miracles than Jesus had done, John 7:31.

2. This remark by the people, overheard by the Pharisees, highly motivated them to go to the chief priests who were their theological foes as Sadducees to get them to send the temple officers after Jesus to arrest Him. (John 7:32; F. F. Bruce, N. T. History, 1972, p. 74-75) Regardless of their theological differences, the Pharisees and the Sadducees saw Jesus as the more immediate, bigger threat than even each other’s group with its differing beliefs, so such theological foes joined company to arrest and execute Christ!

3. Jesus then taught that though He would be with the people of Israel for a little while longer, He would go to Him Who had sent Him, and that they would not then be able to find Him or join Him, John 7:33-34.

4. This statement distracted the religious leaders from arresting Jesus, for they wondered among themselves if He was going to dispersed Israel or to the Gentiles, so they still failed to arrest Him, John 7:35-36!

Lesson: The repeat failure of Israel’s religious leaders to arrest and kill Jesus though the temple crowd knew that was their goal and though the leaders were upset that the crowd began to believe in Him revealed Jesus’ credibility as Messiah, for it was not God’s time for Him to die and God was keeping Jesus’ foes from even arresting Him.

Application: (1) May we believe in Jesus’ credibility as God’s Messenger and Messiah by the evidence of the strong force of God that repeatedly kept Israel’s religious leaders from arresting Him due to God’s timetable for Christ’s death. (2) May we rest in God’s sovereignty over even our spiritual foes as God fulfills His will in our lives.