Scripture: John 8:21-32

How Could They Not Recognize Jesus?

At first sight, I wonder how the Jewish leaders could be so blind that they could not recognize who Jesus was. “Who are you?” they ask him. But when I think about it, I start to understand that the Jews, that is the establishment and the educated Jews, were bewildered with the phenomenon “Jesus.”

Jesus, especially in the Gospel of John, has a very provocative way of expressing himself. “You will die in your sin… you are from below, I am from above.” In verse 44 he says, “You belong to your father, the devil.” In John 6:56 he says they must eat his flesh and drink his blood to have eternal life. This made even many of his disciples turn away from him.

Honestly, how would you react if somebody talked to you like this? Understandably, to the educated Jews this was blasphemous. How do I react to somebody who says things which seem blasphemous to me?

At the end of this chapter (v 59), the Jews are so angry they want to stone Jesus. It is easy for us to say the Jews were blind and they sinned by refusing to recognize the Messiah. (By the way, there were always those who accepted and were changed by what Jesus said.) But I wonder why Jesus couldn’t have used language and images that got the message across in a more acceptable way?

In the end, the Jewish leaders convinced the crowds that Jesus had to die. And they convinced Pontius Pilate − even though he found no guilt in Jesus – that he must crucify him. And so Jesus died at the hands of those who could not accept his message and were alarmed by his call to reform Judaism. That’s right, Jesus did not come to overthrow Judaism and start a new religion, he came as a reformer. His message was not to abandon the laws of Moses, but to go back to their origin: “to love your God and to love your neighbor.” (Matthew 22:40) What a good message! But why didn’t he bring it less provocatively?

It seems reformers are rarely welcome. They are a provocation in themselves. Centuries later, the Church killed or expelled reformers: Petrus Valdes, Jan Huss, Martin Luther, Huldrych Zwingli and many others. And after the Reformation, the Reformed Church persecuted and killed those who wanted to reform the “reformed” church: the Baptists and the Mennonites, for example.

What would have happened if Jesus hadn’t been killed? If the Jews – the Jewish establishment – had welcomed his provocations and reformed Judaism? Where would we be today? Likely, we would not know about the One True God, the Trinitarian God. We would be idolaters. As Paul writes in Romans, “Because of the Jews’ transgression, salvation has come to the Gentiles.” (11:11)

So it had to be, that we might be saved. Was Jesus so provocative because he knew he had to die for us? Maybe. But as Paul writes in Romans 11:25: “A partial hardening has come upon Israel, until the fullness of the Gentiles has come in.”

Prayer: God of Israel, thank you that you love all mankind! Help us to appreciate that Israel had to suffer on our behalf. May we demonstrate your love, so that unbelievers may recognize the Messiah and be saved! Amen.