John
7:31-33, 45-53 (NIV) Still, many in the crowd put their faith in him. They
said, "When the Christ comes, will he do more miraculous signs than this
man?"
32 The
Pharisees heard the crowd whispering such things about him. Then the chief
priests and the Pharisees sent temple guards to arrest him.
. . .
45
Finally the temple guards went back to the chief priests and Pharisees, who
asked them, "Why didn't you bring him in?"
46
"No one ever spoke the way this man does," the guards declared.
47
"You mean he has deceived you also?" the Pharisees retorted. 48
"Has any of the rulers or of the Pharisees believed in him? 49 No! But
this mob that knows nothing of the law — there is a curse on them."
50
Nicodemus, who had gone to Jesus earlier and who was one of their own number,
asked, 51 "Does our law condemn anyone without first hearing him to find
out what he is doing?"
52 They
replied, "Are you from Galilee, too? Look into it, and you will find that
a prophet does not come out of Galilee."
NOTE: I think these
verses continue a theme about how people view Jesus Christ. To those who are
willing to look at the evidence, it is overwhelming. You must be able to
classify Jesus. You cannot just say he was a good man because good men do not
claim to be the bread of life, to be living water, to be the resurrection and
the life, to be the gate into life, to be the good shepherd, to be the way, the
truth and the life, and finally by believing in Jesus, you will have eternal
life. No, this is not just a good man, he is a liar, a crazy man, or the Son of
God. And if he is the Son of God who came from Heaven, everything he says is
"deadly" true. The intellectuals, who had already made of their mind
(he was a liar controlled by Satan), did not want to dig into the evidence.
They dismissed the crowd as a mob, easily deceived, and uneducated. The very
same thing that Atheists and supposed intellectuals say of Christians today.
When one of their number, such as Nicodemus, actually try to raise an
objection, they pull out an unfounded truth (which is founded truth in their
opinion) and slap the person down. They are the intellectuals, the supposedly
open minded, but they are the greatest fools of all, because they misread the
times. In their pride, they could not see their need, and so rejected eternal
life. That is such a sad story, but it is repeated every day. Our job as
believers is to live in such a way that the unbeliever is forced to reexamine
his opinions of Jesus Christ and hopefully to find the life he offers.
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