Clough John Lesson 14

The Messianic Claim – John 2:18-25

We will continue our study of Jesus first trip to Jerusalem. Since John 2:11 John has been concerned to, as his theme is, to prove that Jesus is the Christ, to give adequate objective evidences so that the person who is trying to believe can believe in good conscience and doesn’t have to go into his closet and work up some sort of an emotional feeling, which is then passed off as faith. John does not ask you to work up an inner feeling in order to believe. John presents you with content full information and then trusts that the Holy Spirit of truth will then take that information and make it clear to our hearts. So therefore John begins with John 2:12, in the first trip to Jerusalem and he tells us how Jesus marched up and cleaned out the temple.

Remember last time how Jesus Christ was able in verses 12-17 to do something that no rabbi had ever done before. He was able to take a large area of that temple and completely strip out the religious goons that occupied that area. He did it with a weapon. For those of you who have qualms about Christians and guns you don’t read John 2 very carefully. Jesus Christ armed Himself with a weapon and He wasn’t waving it at men, He was hitting them with it. There is a time and a place to use weapons against rebellious people and Jesus Christ was not at all hesitant to do this. You recall that in the temple the exact place that Jesus Christ operated was a rather large temple, it was not the small thing that people conceive it to be; He went into the court of the Gentiles, the area which was open to Gentile men and Jewish women and there He proceeded to clean out the area. The important thing to remember is the largeness of it, it’s this entire outward area that was involved, particularly this southern wall. This obviously raised a lot of eyebrows when Christ did it. Close up we have another look at this courtyard and there is the door that goes into the inner area; it’s that inner area that will become the subject for the next part of John 2. Jesus is going to talk about that in contra distinction to this outer area. But again, keep in mind the largeness of this whole thing. This was not a small operation that Jesus did; there were many hundreds of people in the area and also keep in mind why Christ did it; He did it in order to give people, men and women, opportunity to trust the Word of God. They were people who were trying to study the Word and who could not study the Word because of all the commotion that was going on. And this caused great anger in the person of Christ and therefore He sought an immediate solution with the aid of weapons.

Now in John 2:18 we have the results. Keep in mind again we will approach this as we have the rest of John’s writing that John gives us the historic event, sometimes he explains it and sometimes he leaves it and only the mature Christian can carry it the next step to see the real depth, the real pearls of revelation that John is presenting us with. He’s telling us about an incident that happened in the temple; that’s what it appears to be, but as we saw last time, particularly when he concludes in verse 17 he has a lot more on his mind than just the temple clearing episode, for he concluded with: “The zeal of thine house has eaten me up,” a quotation from Psalm 69 which was the suffering righteous servant Psalm and was therefore clearly pointing to the death of Christ and the irony John says in effect, from verses 12-17, is that Jesus Christ’s zeal in preparing the way so that men can approach God on a face to face basis and not just the way for Jewish males but for the women and the Gentile people, Jesus Christ is the Savior of all men John says, not just of Jewish males; He is the Savior of all men and because He is the Savior of all men therefore the very zeal that He uses to try to clear the way between God and man incurs the anger, the hatred and the animosity of His enemies. And later on at Christ’s trial it will be this incident that is brought up in the courtroom to bring conviction against Him. At this point Jesus Christ offended the religious group, Annas and his sons, and incurred the wrath of a group of people that had mental attitude sins and so on and eventually this would crucify Him.

So in John 2:18 John uses a peculiar expression, and expression that maybe we’re not used to seeing…we’re used to seeing it so much we fail to notice there’s something unusual about the way it’s used in verse 18. It says, “Then answered the Jews, and said unto Him,” now we see that all the time in Scripture so you don’t normally think anything of it, but let me ask a question. What did Jesus do? Did He ask a question that they answered Him? Look as hard as you will in verse 12-17 but you won’t find Jesus ever asking a question that demands an answer. Well then why does John say, “Then answered the Jews, and said unto Him.” The reason he uses this is to point our attention to the fact that this entire mob reaction that we are about to witness is an answer to what Christ did. Jesus was, by walking in the temple, asking them a question. He was asking them whether you believe that I am the Messiah or not; and therefore this is the answer.

“Then answered the Jews, and said unto him, What sign do you show us, seeing that you do these things?” What sign? Now this is a word that doesn’t necessarily mean a directly miraculous act; it could mean any peculiar thing. The irony is that Jesus just got through showing them a sign, didn’t He? And so what does this answer tell you immediately in verse 18? These people are blind, the man just gave them a sign, He’s the one that cleared the temple, He’s the one that cleared the way between God and man and the very time that He gives the sign they turn around and say what sign do you give us. So right here, the first time Jesus goes public with His ministry you get an answer on the part of a mob that shows spiritual darkness. Keep that in mind because this whole narrative ends with a similar note saying a similar thing. These people are blind, they don’t see what just happened in front of their face.

What sign are You showing us that You do these things? Now the Jews were prepared for the Messiah, they were taught that before the age of the Messiah great things were to be done and this is what they looked for, and they said now you do these things, that is you come in and you clean out the temple, and obviously they caught the Messianic implication when Jesus said this is “My Father’s” temple, Jesus wasn’t just saying, like we say, God is my Father. Jesus was saying God is My direct Father and He was therefore claiming something that no man had ever dared to claim; walking into a mob of hundreds and hundreds of people, beating many up with a whip, throwing out the animals, overturning the moneychanger’s tables and remember the kind of goons that would be associated with this kind of racketeering, all of that and then they say you did all these things, now where is your authority to do those things. That’s what they’re asking, where is your authority? The irony is that Jesus in verse 17 has just told them, by prophecy, what the sign will be. The sigh will be that you people who hate Me because of something I have just done for you, you yourselves are going to provide the sign because you yourselves are going to crucify Me. That’s the sign. And now he’s going to develop that.

So in John 2:19 Jesus makes a statement that will later on be used in court against Him. “Jesus answered and said unto them, Destroy this temple, and in three days I will raise it up.” Now there’s a play on words; normally the Greek word for temple is heros; heros is the word for the large temple that you saw in that picture, complete with all the porticos and everything. But Jesus doesn’t use that; He says destroy this naos, and I will raise it up. Now what is the point that Jesus is making? He’s deliberately playing on some words. So let’s go back and take another look at this temple and see if we notice something about the way that temple was made and therefore come to a little better understanding of Jesus challenge to the crowd.

Once again looking at the temple, notice how big it is, notice this immense size; this four tower is the fortress of Antonia, this is the area that Paul was rescued from, the Roman soldiers kept lookouts there, notice how high it is, so they can look down into the court. This whole area is the temple area; this is the heros; now the word naos is used primarily for the center of the whole thing. So Jesus in effect is saying destroy the naos like you’ve already destroyed the heros and I’ll raise it up in three days. There’s the outer court; that door only Jewish males could enter, after they entered through this area you have the exposure of the central naos, or the central sanctuary. It looks like this; here’s the door through which all Jewish males could go; there’s the door through which only Jewish Levite priests could go, and here is the central sanctuary. The next picture shows that central sanctuary; here are the steps, here is the door, here is the central door. It was a rather impressive type of structure and it’s that that Jesus speaks of when He says the naos, destroy that and in three days I’ll raise it up.

Now looking back at John 2, examining carefully His words, “destroy the naos,” it appeared to refer to that central Herodian temple; that’s what everyone thought that heard Him. It was quite normal for the word naos to be used of the central area. Now to show you how the people reacted to this, they never forgot this saying, they may have forgotten other things Jesus said and did but this was a challenge that no person who lived in the city of Jerusalem would ever forget and to show you how this particular word of Christ came back to haunt Him again and again and again, I want to take three or four verses in the New Testament to show where this phrase comes up. By the way, this is testimony to the validity of the fourth Gospel, to show you that the fourth Gospel is not something like your liberal critics, was something in the 2^nd century, like some of your professors of Bible at liberal seminaries teach, that John is not reliable, it’s a later Hellenistic version of the Christian faith.

To show you such is not the case, turn to Matthew 26; if John was written so late isn’t it strange that parts of John’s Gospel show up in Matthew? Since this particular saying never occurs in any other Gospel it’s evident that John is recording an event that happened that was so crucial it came to be evidence, it came to be cited as the key evidence to crucify Christ. In other words, they really hung Him on this point. Matthew 26:60, this is during the trial; [59] they “sought a false witness against Jesus, to put Him to death, [60] But found none, yea, though many false witnesses came, yet they found none. At last came two false witnesses, [61] And said, This fellow said, I am able to destroy the temple of God, and to build it in three days.” Now He never said that, did He? He said you destroy the temple and I’ll build it. But what this false witness says, “I am able to destroy…” of course He was, but that’s a false witness, Jesus never said that. It was introduced as court evidence; this saying was produced in a court of law and it occurs only one other place in the New Testament and that is in the Gospel of John. And it shows you that if John’s a phony Gospel, it’s strange isn’t it, that it makes central the event that led to Christ’s crucifixion.

In Matthew 27:40, not only was this saying remembered by the people in the court of law at Jesus trial, but in Matthew 27:40 we have the mob that looked upon Him as He was crucified, and they said, “Thou that destroyest the temple, and build it in three days, save thyself. [If you be the Son of God, come down from the cross.]” So the popular people never forgot this little incident that happened so early in Jesus career.

And then not only was Jesus haunted by the saying that He just made in the temple but the early Christians were too; turn to Acts 6, it was thrown up in the face of the early believers again and again and again; your founder, your Messiah, you know what He said to do, He threatened to destroy the temple. Acts 6:13, here is Stephen’s trial, the first martyr of the Christian church and the same theme comes up again. “And set up false witnesses, who said, This man ceases not to speak blasphemous words against this holy place,” “…against this holy place” means against the temple. The only message that we know that the 1^st century Christians taught was that Jesus Christ replaced the temple. That was the sensitive sore spot among the people of the time.

Finally Acts 21:28, Paul’s trial, see every time there was a trial this was always introduced into the court as evidence. This is the third trial, Christ’s trial, Stephen’s trial and now Paul’s trial. “Crying out, men of Israel, this is the man that teaches all men everywhere against the people, against the Law, and against this place.” “Against this place” is the temple, Herod’s temple, the temple you just saw in the slides. So this was a very, very extremist viewpoint.

Now as time went on and as Christians had time to meditate upon it, they began to realize certain things; Matthew, Mark and Luke, they wrote their Gospels but as the years when by and the Holy Spirit worked in the hearts of Christians, John, the old man and the last Gospel writer, finally said now I see what goes on here; I see what the Holy Spirit has been trying to teach the Church. Time and time again we’ve had this thrown into our face at our trials, that we are the ones that destroyed the temple. And so John, turning back to John 2 is going to explain that incident. When John writes his Gospel he’s writing it after many of these trials have occurred. Read the Gospel of John retrospectively, read it looking back at the trials that have already occurred. This is a defense of the Christian position against its enemies. And John is therefore going to lend explanation.

John sees something, and here’s some of the truths that operate in John’s mind, then we’ll go back to the text, verse by verse and pick up these truths. One of the truths that John sees, that he never lets us forget, both in his Gospel and in the book of Revelation which was also authored by the same man, and that is that the place of God is with men. In Revelation 21 and 22, when the universe is transformed, after all of history ends, God does not have His temple on Galaxy 442 some place. God has His temple on this planet. Theologically the planet earth is the center of the universe. The Pythagoras end view of cosmogony is correct spiritually; the earth is the center of the universe. We have no need that there will be found on another planet beings of a higher order in God’s sight. Jesus Christ did not incarnate Himself on Mars, He incarnated Himself on earth. And we can show that the incarnation only happened once and it was not multiple and did not happen at various points in the universe. It happened only once, at one point; therefore how significant the planet earth.

So the place of God is with men. And when God finally comes to dwell with men the book of Revelation says something very interesting; when God’s home is with men there’s no more temple, the temple is done away, and that’s an interesting remark. The temple is a temporary place, it’s a meeting point now, inside mortal history, for God and man; we get together at a meeting point, but always it will not be so. God is moving history to the point where there will be full open fellowship at any point in the universe between Himself and man. And church of Christ is a step into that direction from the Old Testament order of things.

Another truth that John perceives is that Jesus is going to destroy the temple in many ways. Here are some ways: first of all, that temple that you saw in the slide wasn’t finished until the year 63-64 BC, somewhere in there. Do you know when it was destroyed? 70 AD, they barely got that thing finished, that big project, sort of like urban renewal, it never gets done but money keeps going into the project. And so you have these projects go on and on and on and on and on and Herod’s building project was no different and barely had they got it done when the Romans took it apart. Did Jesus destroy the temple? Yeah, in a way, because the Jews in rejecting Jesus Christ brought upon themselves the fifth degree of discipline and the destruction of the temple. So destroy the temple, yeah, reject Me and you’ll destroy your temple.

And then in another way Jesus destroyed the temple; Jesus destroyed the temple because the Christian New Testament documents, the epistles, the Christian way of life replaces all that the temple stood for, the Torah, the Law, the priesthood, all of that is gone with the introduction of the New Testament. The New Testament does replace the temple and the Church becomes the new temple, Ephesians 2. So in those ways the temple has been destroyed and the Christian system did destroy the temple.

John has those in mind but in particular another thing, John 2:20, he goes on to explain the reaction of the Jewish people at that time. “Then said the Jews, Forty and six years was this temple in building, and you’re going to raise it up in three days?” And that’s a comment on the fact that this thing had gone on and on and on and on. Herod began this when Jesus wasn’t even born and he built it to appease the Jews. Herod was never well liked among the Jews and he had to buy them off with these great building projects, like American voters are being bought of by various government projects; we have everything from food stamps on down and it’s just an attempt to buy votes. So politics was no different in this day and age when the politicians catered to the low class, the scum and the parasites by various building projects. So therefore he says forty and six years you had this government project going on and you threaten to build it in three days.

But now John 2:21 adds this editorial comment, this was added after John could think about it. John took years before he got to verse 21, it was not… it’s very easy for us to say oh yeah, he meant his body; that’s just because we’ve got John to help us but if you had been there and if I had been there and we saw this whole thing, we wouldn’t have gotten it until years later when we’d finally put it all together. And John puts it all together and he injects his editorial note right in the middle of this narrative and he says I want you to understand that when Jesus spoke of the naos He wasn’t talking about that central place. What He was talking about was the temple of His own body. [“But He spoke of the temple of His body.”]

Then John 2:22 John explains when he got this insight, “When, therefore, He was risen from the dead, His disciples remembered that He had said this unto them,” so this wasn’t clear until at least three years later, it took that long for the disciples to think on these things and understand the full impact of what Christ really taught. There’s a verse later on in John; John 14:26 that talks about the Holy Spirit is bringing all things in remembrance to you; here it is operating. John 2:21-22 is one manifestation of John 14:26, the Holy Spirit opens up the words of Jesus to the believers. You hear them, you know them, you can memorize them, but it takes the Holy Spirit to open your heart to what He’s really, really saying; there’s a spiritual insight and some can get it and some can’t and it depends on your level of maturity as you keep on growing. Always strain to get it.

Then they say, John 1:22b, John begins as he always does to deepen further this event with these little easily passed over verses that mean so much. He says, “they believed the Scripture, and the word which Jesus had said.” Now that’s an easy thing to read through, you can read it through so fast you never even notice it. But wait a minute, let’s stop, what does that mean? “They believed the Scripture and the word,” what Scripture? What Scripture was it that they had talked about in that incident? It was Psalm 69 wasn’t it? “The zeal of thine house has eaten me up.” Now what do we mean by believe then? Didn’t these first century Christians believe the Old Testament? Of course; so this word “believe” in verse 22 can’t mean I believe that Psalm 69 is the Word of God, for they believed that before. Well then what does the word “believe” mean if it doesn’t mean they believed Psalm 69 to be the Word of God? It means something else. What’s the theme of John’s Gospel? Believe that Jesus is the Christ, and so the word “believe” doesn’t mean they believed the Scripture as the Word of God, it means they believed the Scriptures are focused on the person of Jesus Christ. That’s what the word “believe” means. And so here we begin to get insight into how pisteuo, the Greek word to believe is used by John. He doesn’t mean believe this is the Word of God. He means believe that the Word of God points to this person, Jesus Christ who is undiminished deity and true humanity in one person. That’s what he means by believe.

And then he means something else, for he says, “They believed the Scripture, and the word which” He spoke. Do you know what that is a claim to? That’s a claim to Jesus’ deity, because what he has just told us is that Jesus words are on a par with Old Testament law. Jesus words are equal to the Old Testament canonical Scripture. And so here is a confession that Christ speaks the Word of God directly and His disciples realized this more and more as they meditated deeply or more deeply upon His character. This is a claim to deity and it’s snuck into the text so carefully that you can read right though it and never see it. You can read this text 35 times and never see the point until you stop and say what is this saying? They say and “they believed the Scripture, and the word,” so this is a Messianic claim.

Now John 2:23, “Now when He was in Jerusalem at the Passover, in the feast day, many believed in His name, when they saw the miracles which He did.” “While He was in Jerusalem,” it’s an imperfect tense in the Greek; the imperfect tense means continuous action. So during His stay in Jerusalem… how long was His stay in Jerusalem? It was for the Passover, he says, and the feast, the feast of Unleavened Bread, and so He was in Jerusalem at least seven days. So while He was in Jerusalem during those seven days, John says, “many believed on His name.” But He wasn’t just in the temple; if you have the Greek text will notice in verse 23 literally it reads, “while He was in the Jerusalems,” plural. Is there more than one city of Jerusalem? What does John mean plural. We have to go back to the city of Jerusalem and see what he’s talking about.

Jesus toured the general area; since many miracles are going to happen in this area we might as well get acquainted with some of this terrain and then later on you’ll see their importance. Here is a map of the Dead Sea, here is Jerusalem. Notice the highland area, the lowlands along the Jordan Valley. This is a slide of the modern city of Jerusalem, the temple area is right here, and the Kidron valley runs this way. To familiarize you with what the terrain looks like and some of the places Jesus stayed we’re going to go up this road along the Kidron Valley; this is the valley that runs north/south just east of the temple. We’re going to go up to a point and look across the valley, first over here at Mount Scopus and then down here at the Mount of Olives. The Mount of Olives is not one mountain, it’s several. We’re going to look at these hills, we’re going to look at Scopus and Mount of Olives. Then were going to go across and stop over at the Mount of Olives and look back to give you an idea of what this area was like; then we’ll go to Bethpage and Bethany; Bethany was the place where the women who did so much to accommodate Jesus during His pretrial days lived. This is looking at Mount Scopus; that is not any mountain by our standards but it gives you an idea of the beginning of the Kidron Valley. This is the north side of the Mount of Olives. Keep in mind all during Jesus’ time this was all wooded; we have the Arabs to thank for stripping the trees out. [he continues showing slides]

There is the area of Bethany. This is the place where Jesus Christ stayed so many times during the Gospels, somewhere in this area for this is the town of Bethany, it’s very small. Those women had their house on this side of the hill; on the other side of the hill was the city of Jerusalem and He came out and He ascended practically in the backyard of the place where He had stayed. You see, Jesus rewards those people who have fellowship with Him. John’s Gospel will be dependent upon our geographic knowledge. Jesus did certain things very close to where those women lived; He didn’t do it in the city; the city people didn’t like it, so even a thing like His ascension He had it deliberately moved back over into the backyard of people that were truly interested His character, where it could not be observed by the people who could care less. And this is a certain reserve to Jesus character that you’ll see again and again in the Gospel of John. Jesus is open to those who are interested and closed and quite reserved to the people who are not interested.

Let’s continue the text. John 1:22, “When he was risen from the dead, His disciples remembered” this, “and they believed the Scripture, and the word which John had said. [23] While He was in Jerusalem at the Passover,” during the week, “many believed in His name,” now that’s the same phrase used in John 1:12, “as many as believed on His name,” same phrase. So this refers to people who are apparently believing and becoming Christians. In John’s Gospel there are three classes of people: there are the class or what we will call the temporary followers, these are people who are not genuine believers, they are people who go along for the ride, as long as Jesus is making food they’re there for the service. As long as Jesus provide some sort of a political hope they’re there, but when it becomes obvious to what Jesus’ true demands are, then they leave and the desert, and that’s why it says in John’s first epistle, they went out from us because they never were with us anyway. The deserters of the Christian faith, the traitors, and those who give up, were simply never born again to begin with says John, a very harsh judgment. And then there’s the circle of believers, like these. They’re believers, but…. And then there’s the inner circle.

Now in a way this is arguing there are two kinds of believers; that’s the only way we can handle the Gospel of John because John does seem to teach that, that there were people who were genuine believers and Jesus had pretty much nothing to do with, and then there were those who were really interested and He gave a lot of attention to those. Jesus, in other words, responded to our desire; it is a testimony in John’s Gospel of Jesus’ response to our volition. If we seek after His fellowship He will make Himself known to us better; if we don’t and could care less, we’re not going to enjoy knowing Him in a deeper and deeper way. So this is the meaning of the next statement coming up.

John 2:24, though many people found Jesus trustworthy, He did not find them trustworthy. “But Jesus did not commit Himself unto them, because He knew all men. [25] And needed not that any man should testify of man; for He knew what was in man.” In other words, He knew these people were flaky and so therefore while they were saved and while they trusted Him, He wasn’t about to let them in on the innermost plans; they were not worthy yet of knowing the person of Jesus Christ in a deeper way. Maybe one day they would; maybe there were people in the outer circle that years later would become part of the inner circle through maturity. But at this point they’re not ready for anything more; they’re just treated as believers and that’s it. Jesus did not let all believers in on His secrets.

Now today this still works because when you’re a new Christian and you read John’s Gospel you read it and you get a blessing out of it. And then later on, maybe four or five years later you study it again and you get a deeper insight into it. And you go through your whole Christian life and that’s the same way, the Holy Spirit always gives an ever deepening view of the person of Christ, if you’re interested. If you’re not, well you just won’t get it. And this principle operates; Jesus is not concerned with those not concerned with Him.

So John 2:25 says He “needed not that any should testify of Him; for He knew what was in man.” We’ve already seen this to some degree. John has a little surprise in store; when we touch verse 25 up with another truth you’re going to see, this is another one of those little jewels that he sows in the text that only come out when you kind of shake it hard. John already has pointed out that when Jesus met people He knew them very well. Remember when Jesus met Peter, He said you’re a rock. Now Peter, for three years was not a rock; some people thought he had rocks in his head but he wasn’t a rock. Peter’s character was not that of a stable man. That’s the whole point of the cock crowing three times problem. Peter was unstable under pressure but Jesus could look into Peter’s character and say Peter, there’s hope for you, in fact Peter, you have tremendous potential as a believer and I see you being the spokesman of believers. And that’s why He said Peter, you are going to be a rock and you’re going to be one of the most stable Christian leaders who have ever lived. So Jesus was able to analyze the potential of a man’s character when He came to him.

Remember what happened to Nathanael; Nathanael comes and he lets it all hang out, he’s that kind of a person. He’s not at all this pseudo-humble thing that you see in Christian circles. Remember Jesus telling him, Nathanael, you’re an Israelite indeed, and Nathanael pops up, You’re sure right, where’d You find that out. There’s no false humility there, there’s nothing wrong with that, yeah, I tend to be that kind of a person, I’m very open. So Jesus could read Nathanael’s character so that was two incidents we’ve already had, now comes this one, and it must have disturbed John because John could say look Jesus, you know, You want a popular movement, You want followers, for heaven’s sake, You’ve got the whole city talking about You. You don’t need any press, You’ve got it; why there are people over in Bethany, people in Bethpage, all the little towns around, all up and down the valley of Kidron, up on Mount Zion, people are talking about You Jesus, all over the environments of Jerusalem because that’s what the word means, in the Jerusalems, meaning the Jerusalem regions. Now Jesus, since You’ve got all people talking about You and since Your object is to bring in the kingdom of God, doesn’t it make sense to draw all these people together and just unload all Your goodies. And it must have bothered John that Jesus apparently could care less; people would believe on Him and He’d just walk away. Well, aren’t You going to follow them up? Aren’t You going to teach them the Word? What Jesus is doing is He’s entrusting the Levitical ministry that should have been following them up to do that. Later on the apostles will follow up, but at this point Jesus has something else on His mind.

He’s got to reveal Himself to the nation and He doesn’t cast His pearls before swine; there is a reserve about Jesus’ character, a reserve, by the way, that some Christians would do well to mimic. Don’t you keep on witnessing to some person who despises the Christian message, to hell with them. You explain the Christian message to them and you be gracious to them; if they despise it let them despise it, there’ll come a time when you can get your points in. There’ll come a time when God will work in their life but don’t ever plead with the unbeliever. Jesus doesn’t get on His knees and plead with people. Jesus is a magnificent Christ, and magnificent Messiahs do not get on their knees before men pleading to please believe on Me. You don’t find that in this Gospel; there’s a majesty about Jesus, you can take it or you can leave it; I love you but I’m not going to get on My knees before you. That’s part of Jesus character, majesty, not maudlin sentimentality that passes for evangelical concern; the evangelical concern is shown by Jesus endangering His life, walking in there, turning the mob against Him because He loved those people enough to clear out the rackets that were affecting the Word of God. But it wasn’t part of love to get on His knees and kiss the feet of everybody in the city of Jerusalem; that’s not love, that’s sentimentality. And evangelicals today in the name of love can’t seem to distinguish one from the other; Jesus is majestic in His love.

So in John 2:25 John says not only does He know Nathanael, not only does He know Peter, but He knows to anthropo, in other words, all mankind, it’s a titanic statement, it means by this time John has meditated on why Jesus… why, Jesus, didn’t You tell these people who You were, why didn’t You make it clearer to them, and over the years John kept struggling with this and struggling with this and struggling with it and finally he realized, after he himself had been a pastor for many years, it doesn’t do any good. You can tell people and tell people and tell people and tell people and they don’t believe any way so why bother. Tell them as much as concerns the issue of the moment and then if they reject that then the heck with it, so you turn somewhere else; you’re wasting your time and you’re wasting the Lord’s time. So John meditated and mediated and finally the Holy Spirit made him realize that Jesus knew the heart of all men.

Is this a small insight? Not when you know a rabbinic teaching current in the time of Jesus Christ. There were seven things the Jewish rabbis taught in this era that no man could have, seven things that were the prerogative of God alone. And these seven things are circulated in every synagogue throughout Palestine. This was on the popular grapevine and we know it because we know the Mishnah; we know the Mishnah reflects the popular Jewish thinking of this time. And one of the seven things that no man could know but God only was what is in the heart of his neighbor. This was a distinct Jewish teaching of that day. No man could know what is in the heart of his neighbor, the theme that occurs in 1 Samuel 16:7, “The LORD seeth not as man seeth; for man looks on the outward appearance, but the LORD looks on the heart.”

Turn to 1 Kings 8:39 to see it in the Old Testament, it’s not just the teaching current in Jesus’ day, it’s roots go way, way back into the Old Testament. If you look at 1 Kings 8:39 you’ll see the point that John’s making. He closes the section here of the trip to Jerusalem, he closes chapter 2 of his Gospel, Jesus needed not that anyone tell Him for He knew what was in men. John doesn’t go on to tell you exactly what he’s just said but he knows that if you’re a curious believer you’ll chase it. And sooner or later the Holy Spirit will guide you to a passage like this one; Solomon’s prayer. “Then hear Thou in heaven, Thy dwelling place, and forgive, and do, and give to every man according to his ways, whose heart Thou knowest (for Thou, even Thou only, knowest the hearts of all the children of men).” See, that was what was on John’s mind when he writes his Gospel; see, Jesus knew the hearts of all men; he is claiming Jesus is God. To a Jew a mere rabbi could not know the hearts of all men. See, familiarity with the Old Testament gives you insight into the New Testament. You could have read John 2 and never even caught the idea John’s put across. You could be one of those people that you meet on the campus every once in a while, why nowhere does Jesus ever claim to be deity. Oh, what did He just claim in John 2? That whole passage is a claim that Jesus is God.

Again notice 1 Kings 8:39, “Thou only knowest the hearts of all the children of men.”

Father, we thank You for…..