EXPLORE IT! - John 5:31-47

These teachings of Jesus where he essentially proclaims himself to be the Messiah are almost only found in The Gospel of John. In the Synoptic Gospels Jesus speaks of himself as the Messiah in this straight forward way only at the very end, shortly before his death. 

All of these teachings occur in Jerusalem, whereas the Synoptic Gospels have very little of Jesus' teachings occurring in Jerusalem and then only before his death. 

Here, Jesus is speaking directly to the Jewish religious leaders of the day, most of whom didn’t believe in either him or his message. Jesus points to John the Baptist's testimony about him as evidence of the truth of his own message.

He says:

“You have sent to John and he has testified to the truth. Not that I accept human testimony; but I mention it that you may be saved. John was a lamp that burned and gave light, and you chose for a time to enjoy his light.”

He then adds:

“I have testimony weightier than that of John. For the works that the Father has given me to finish—the very works that I am doing—testify that the Father has sent me. And the Father who sent me has himself testified concerning me. You have never heard his voice nor seen his form, nor does his word dwell in you, for you do not believe the one he sent.”

He also says that these leaders study the scriptures hoping for eternal life, but that the scriptures speak of him, and they still refuse to come to him for life. 

They’ll accept people who preach in their own name but not in one who comes in the name of the Father. 

He asks, "How can you believe if you accept praise from one another, yet make no effort to obtain the praise that comes from the only God?"

He then speaks of Moses as the accuser of humanity. 

And he says:

"But do not think I will accuse you before the Father. Your accuser is Moses, on whom your hopes are set. If you believed Moses, you would believe me, for he wrote about me. But since you do not believe what he wrote, how are you going to believe what I say?"

When Jesus says that they believe in Moses, what he is essentially saying is that they believe in the Bible. They believed that Moses wrote the first five books of the Bible, which were known as the Torah. The Jewish leaders considered these first five books to be the most important books of the whole Bible, and they spent their whole lives studying them.

The irony here is that they loved the Bible, but they didn’t love the God that the Bible spoke about. They thought it was great literature (which it is) and that it was full of wonderful, life changing teachings (which it is) and that it pointed people to the way of pure and everlasting life (which it does), but they didn’t embrace the full message.

They had an image of God and of the Messiah in their own heads that they just couldn’t get rid of – a false image – an idol. They made God into their own image, rather than letting God conform them into his image. They loved the Bible. They thought it was the best thing ever. But they failed to understand the point it all. They came to worship the “word of God” instead of the “Word of God.”