A FEAST OF CONTROVERSY – John 7:1-52

Posted by Pastor Greg Allen on November 28, 2012 under PM Bible Study |

PM Home Bible Study Group; November 28, 2012

John 7:1-52

Theme: This chapter describes the controversy over Jesus as He taught at the Feast of Tabernacles.

(Unless otherwise noted, all Scripture references are taken from The Holy Bible, New King James Version; copyright 1982, Thomas Nelson, Inc.)

This chapter begins with the words, “After these things . . .” The events that it describes occurred after Jesus had fed the 5,000 and had responded to the words of opposition He had received in chapter 6. This chapter describes events, then, that were about the controversy that Jesus was causing—and the controversy about Him was growing!

In this chapter, the controversies about Him are told in the context of His visit to Jerusalem at the time of the annual Feast of Tabernacles. This is one of the three annual feasts for which according to the law of Moses, the Jews were required to make a pilgrimage to Jerusalem: the Feast of Unleavened Bread (associated with Passover), the Feast of Pentecost (or the Feast of Weeks), and the Feast of Tabernacles (preceded by the Feast of Trumpets and the Day of Atonement (see Exodus 23:14-19; also Numbers 28:16-29:40). This last feast, the Feast of Tabernacles, was a reminder to the Jewish people of their rest in the land of promise (see Leviticus 23:33-38). In the prophecy of Zechariah, this feast marked the full rest of God’s people under the reign of the Messiah (see Zechariah 14:16-21).

It’s significant, then, that the controversial claims that the Lord Jesus made in this chapter were made during the Feast of Tabernacles. He was presenting Himself as the Messiah, and was inviting the people to look to Him for the fulfillment of the promised ‘rest’ from God.

I. DELAYING TO GO (vv. 1-9).

A. We’re told that Jesus’ brothers urged Him to go from Galilee to Jerusalem for the feast. We’re given the names of these brothers in Mark 6:3. They told Him, “Depart from here and go into Judea, that Your disciples also may see the works that You are doing. For no one does anything in secret while he himself seeks to be known openly. If You do these things, show Yourself to the world” (vv. 3-4). But we’re told that they said this because even they did not believe in Him. It may be that they only believed as many of the others did—that any expression of Jesus’ kingdom would be strictly earthly; and they didn’t believe on Him as the Son of the living God who had the words of eternal life, as the twelve had come to believe about Him (see 6:68-69). Or it may even be that they spoke these words cynically. We know, however, that some of them later came to believe on Him. They were in the upper room after His resurrection (Acts 1:14); and they were held up as eyewitnesses of His resurrection (1 Corinthians 15:7). Two of them (James and Jude) wrote books that are contained in our New Testament.

B. Whatever their motive was for urging Him to go may have been, He did not do as they urged. He declared that His time had not yet come. Their “time”—because they were, at this time, among those who were of the world that hated Him—was “always ready”. But He operated on a different time-schedule than they did. He was under the Father’s schedule; and He would only act in accordance with the Father’s will. Some texts have it in verse 8 that He said He was “not” going up; others have it that He was “not yet” going up. It’s made clear in verse 10 that He went up after them. Perhaps He didn’t go with them because doing so would have involved them in part of a movement to overthrow the Romans and seek to set Him up as King before God’s time (see 6:15). In any case, He remained in Galilee while they went. Our Savior would not run ahead of the Father’s plan; but would only go when His “time” had “come” (six months later, during Passover; see John 12:23).

II. ARRIVING IN SECRET (vv. 10-13).

A. His brothers had gone to Jerusalem for the feast; but not with Him. He came afterwards; “but not openly, but as it were in secret” (v. 10). This was because He was a wanted man (see v. 1). He didn’t hide because He was afraid, though. It was because the proper time had not yet come. As the Lamb of God, He could not be put to death until Passover. Nevertheless, many were looking for Him and were talking about Him.

B. John tells us that there was “much complaining among the people concerning Him” (v. 12). Some were saying that He was “good”; others were saying that He “deceives the people”. But, as John tells us, “no one spoke openly of Him for fear of the Jews” (v. 13). It may even be that His coming in secret helped stir up the anticipation about Him and spread the talk about Him; so that when He revealed Himself at the feast, He truly was the center of attention. He is even still today!

III. TEACHING IN THE TEMPLE (vv. 14-24).

A. It was in the midst of this atmosphere of anticipation and controversy that He rose up to teach. He began to do so “about the middle of the feast” (v. 14); and He did so in the temple. People marveled at Him—wondering how he could “know letters” (that is, teach like a scholar), and yet never had studied in the schools of the Pharisees and Scribes (v. 14). The reason that Jesus Himself gave was that His doctrine was not His own but had been given to Him by the one who “sent” Him—that is, the heavenly Father. He declared that there is an inherent inward validation of the divine authority of His teaching: “If anyone wills to do His will, he shall know concerning the doctrine, whether it is from God or whether I speak on My own authority” (v. 17).

B. In His teaching, He was not afraid to point to the controversy He had stirred up. Not long before this, He had healed the lame man at the Pool of Bethesda (see John 5:1-15). We’re told that the Jews sought to kill Him because He did this on the Sabbath (5:16). Therefore, He told them that they were inconsistent with the law of Moses; because they sought to kill Him in violation of it (v. 19). They dismissed His words as crazy by saying, “You have a demon. Who is seeking to kill You?” (v. 20). And Jesus answered that it was because of His act of mercy to the lame man. And to demonstrate their inconsistency, He said; “I did one work, and you all marvel. Moses therefore gave you circumcision (not that it is from Moses, but from the fathers), and you circumcise a man on the Sabbath. If a man receives circumcision on the Sabbath, so that the law of Moses should not be broken, are you angry with Me because I made a man completely well on the Sabbath? Do not judge according to appearance, but judge with righteous judgment” (vv. 21-24). What a day of instruction in the temple that must have been!

IV. IMPRESSION ON THE CROWD (vv. 25-36).

A. This sort of teaching only stirred up more of the talk about Him. Some marveled that He—who the Jews were seeking to kill—taught publicly; and wondered if the reason they were leaving Him alone was because they had come to believe that He truly is the Christ (vv. 25-26). Others in their midst held doubts about this—thinking (mistakenly; based on Jewish legends about the Messiah) that He couldn’t be the Christ because “when the Christ comes, no one knows where He is from” (v. 27).

B. Jesus spoke in such a way to widen the divide even further. He cried out in the temple as He taught—as if speaking to those who were even then expressing their doubts about Him—and said, “You both know Me, and you know where I am from; and I have not come of Myself, but He who sent Me is true, whom you do not know But I know Him, for I am from Him, and He sent Me” (vv. 28-29). As a result, some who rejected Him sought to take Him but were unable to “because”, as John said, “His hour had not yet come” (v. 30). Others were even more convinced and came to believe in Him; saying, “When the Christ comes, will He do more signs than these which this Man has done?” (v. 31).

C. Those who were receptive to Him were—no doubt—thinking as so many did; that His reign would be an earthly one that would release His people from Roman occupation. But the murmuring within the crowd was all that the Pharisees could take. They—along with the chief priests—sent officers to arrest Him. He declared to them, “I shall be with you a little while longer, and then I go to Him who sent Me. You will seek Me and not find Me, and where I am you cannot come” (vv. 33-34). This, of course, He spoke concerning His death, burial, resurrection, and ascension. But they didn’t understand this. They thought He was saying that He was going to leave them and go to the dispersed Jews who dealt among the Greeks. His words only led to further confusion about Him.

V. PROMISE AT THE END (vv. 37-39).

A. The final day of the feast came. Jewish tradition tells us that, “on the last day, that great day of the feast”, the priest would take a pitcher of gold or silver, and draw some water out of the pool of Siloam; and then, with much celebration, bring it into the temple and pour it out before the altar—a symbolic act commemorating God’s promised rest for the people of Israel following their time of wandering. Perhaps the priest quoted such passages as Isaiah 12:3, “Therefore with joy you will draw water from the wells of salvation”; or 44:3, “For I will pour water on him who is thirsty, and floods on the dry ground; I will pour My Spirit on your descendants, and My blessing on your offspring . . .”; or 55:1, “Ho! Everyone who thirsts, come to the waters . . . ” Yet, it was on this very important day that Jesus stood up and declared; “If anyone thirsts, let him come to Me and drink. He who believes in Me, as the Scripture has said, out of his heart will flow rivers of living water.” He thus declared Himself to be the very source of rest that the symbolic pouring of water represented.

B. We’re told that He spoke this of the Holy Spirit, “whom those believing in Him would receive” (v. 39). He spoke, however, with respect to a future time; because “the Holy Spirit was not yet given, because Jesus was not yet glorified.” That would not happen until the upcoming feast of Pentecost!

VI. DIVISIONS AMONG THE PEOPLE (vv. 40-44).

A. Again, the people were even more divided in their opinion of Him. Some said “Truly this is the Prophet” (thinking of the promise from Moses in Deuteronomy 18). Others said, “This is the Christ” (that is, the Messiah). But others still strongly disagreed. “Will the Christ come out of Galilee?

B. What confusion the people were in! They had already said that no one would know where the Messiah would come from; but they now declared that He could not come from Galilee—a region that was looked down upon by the Jews. They said that the Scriptures declared that the Messiah would come “from the seed of David and from the town of Bethlehem” (v. 42; see Micah 5:2). And in this, they were correct. But they apparently didn’t know that this was precisely where Jesus had come from! The desire to apprehend Him became even stronger—but no one could do it. (Some people would still probably want to lay hands on Him today—if they could only get to Him!)

VII. UNBELIEF OF THE RULERS (vv. 45-52).

A. Remember back in verse 32, where we’re told that the Pharisees and the chief priests had sent officials to arrest Him? Those officials came back empty handed. When asked why they hadn’t arrested Him, they simply said, “No man ever spoke like this Man!” (v. 46). Imagine! They went to arrest Him; but began to listen to Him and failed to do what they came to do! The Pharisees asked if they too had been deceived like—as they thought— the ignorant crowds that listened to Him. The common people were ignorant of the law—or so they thought. None of the rulers of the Pharisees, they said, had believed on Him; and they thought this would be a further condemnation of those who did so. But instead, it was only a condemnation of the rulers of the Pharisees!

B. Nicodemus—a Pharisee that interviewed Jesus by night in John 3—asked “Does our law judge a man before it hears him and knows what he is doing?” (v. 51). But the rest of the Pharisees only insulted him—comparing him with the Galileans that they despised. “Search and look”, they said, “for no prophet has arisen out of Galilee” (v. 52). They were terribly mistaken about this—completely ignoring the promise of Isaiah 9:1-2: “Nevertheless the gloom will not be upon her who is distressed, as when at first He lightly esteemed the land of Zebulun and the land of Naphtali, and afterward more heavily oppressed her, by the way of the sea, beyond the Jordan, in Galilee of the Gentiles. The people who walked in darkness have seen a great light; those who dwelt in the land of the shadow of death, upon them a light has shined.” But apparently Nicodemus was not swayed by the unbelief of his fellow Pharisees. He later—along with Joseph of Arimathea—would assist in our Lord’s burial (see John 19:38-42).

* * * * * * * * * *

The Feast of Tabernacles, then, symbolized the rest of the people of God. And Jesus presents Himself as that very “rest”. He stirred up a lot of controversy when He declared these things about Himself; and yet He remains still today what He presented Himself then to be. The decisive question is, will we believe Him or not?

Perhaps there’s no better way to conclude than with the invitation of Hebrews 4:9-16:

There remains therefore a rest for the people of God. For he who has entered His rest has himself also ceased from his works as God did from His.

Let us therefore be diligent to enter that rest, lest anyone fall according to the same example of disobedience. For the word of God is living and powerful, and sharper than any two-edged sword, piercing even to the division of soul and spirit, and of joints and marrow, and is a discerner of the thoughts and intents of the heart. And there is no creature hidden from His sight, but all things are naked and open to the eyes of Him to whom we must give account.

Seeing then that we have a great High Priest who has passed through the heavens, Jesus the Son of God, let us hold fast our confession For we do not have a High Priest who cannot sympathize with our weaknesses, but was in all points tempted as we are, yet without sin. us therefore come boldly to the throne of grace, that we may obtain mercy and find grace to help in time of need (Hebrews 4:9-16).