14th July, 2013
Written By Rev Law Hui Seng
Posted By Teresa Han
John 7:1-24
Main Idea: Make judgement based on the word of God/truth.
Objectives: To challenge the congreation to make judgement based on the word of God/truth.
A. Introduction
- We all make judgements everyday. Sometimes we even make judgements about peoples’ character and personality. We say so and so is selfish, greedy, bias, telling lie, and proud. So and so is honest, can be trusted, hardworking, responsible and wise. These are negative and positive judgements we make about peoples’ character. We say so and so tend to be negative, boastful, and neglect details and careless. So and so tend to be a very positive person; very detailed person and hardly make mistakes in giving information and calculation; tend to be objective in his/her outlook. This is making judgements about someone’s personality. Do you agree?
- Judges in the court make judgements about who is guilty after both the acussed and the prosecutor submitted their facts that counter one another. Sometimes the judgements delivered according to the law of the country can result in fine, jail sentences, canning, confinement to a locality, and even death sentence. Judges make judgements and the guilty party will be punished.
- All of us who make judgements will have consequences also. Whatever the judgement you make, wrong or right judgement, there are implications. Therefore, we need to consider very carefully, before we make any judgement that has implications on ourselves, family, neighour, colleagues, relatives, and even the whole society.
- As disciples of Jesus, by all means we make judgements which bless as people as possible.
- In Jesus’ time, He challenged people to make right judgement about who He was. He was very frustrated with the fellow Jews who judged Him wrongly about His identity. That was why He said in verse 24, “Stop judging by mere appearances, and make a right judgement.”
- I strongly believe Jesus is still teaching us and challenging us to make a right judgement about Him and about the truth today? Let us see the context of His challenge.
B. The Context of His challenge to make a right judgement
- The Gospel of John is written with the purpose to challenge readers to become disciples of Jesus, that is to choose to follow Jesus as Messiah or Saviour. So, you see the Jews, all the Jewish religious leaders and the Pharisees in the background actually either agree with Jesus about His messiahship or disagree with it. Jesus challenged them to switch over to His side and follow Him as messiah.
- As a result, there was great tension between Jesus and all the Jewish religious groups who could not agree with Him. You should sense this dangerous tension as you read the gosple of John. I say it was a dangerous tension because the opposing Jews actually plot to kill Him for they could not agree that He was the Messiah sent by God. They even accused Jesus of blaspheming God for His claim as Messiah.
- John 5:18, it says the Jews plot to kill Him because He made Himself equal with God. They mooted the idea to kill Jesus after He commanded the invalid to take the mat and walk. He did it and he was healed. Jesus broke the law of Sabbath because He asked someone to the mat and walked. The Jews were very angry with Him and wanted to to kill Him.
- And obviously, there were Jews, even including Pharisees who believe Jesus as the one sent by God. The famous example is Nicodemus. John 3 talked about Nicodemus who was a Pharisee who belonged to Jewish ruling council came to meet Jesus secretly at night and asked about how to enter kingdom of God. Jesus answered that a person must be born again by water and spirit.
- And in John 9:22, the author of the gospel of John quoted the parents whose son was healed by Jesus of his born blindness and was investigated by the Pharisees; the parents were of the Jews because they had decided that anyone who acknowleged Jesus as the Christ/Messiah would be excommunicated from the Synagogue. This shows that there were Jews who switched to Jesus secretly. All these show that some Jews were influenced by Jesus deeds and teaching.
- In the face of such tension Jesus’ life was endangered. In verse 1, it said so. Verse 13 says that nobody \dared to say anything public about Jesus for fear of the Jews who would excommunicate them from the synagogue. At the same time, there were Jews who could only whispered that Jesus was a good man (verse 12). Others said He deceived people (verse 12).
- Half way through the celebration of the Feast of Tabernacle (Jews commerating how God provided for them in wilderness when they managed to build shelter in the 40 years of wilderness life), Jesus decided to go to Jerusalem temple courts secretly and taught (verse 14). His teaching actually by any standard amazed people though He did not receive from any recognized Jewish authority (verse 15).
- Jesus was not lying when He secretly went to the Feast of Tabernacle though He did not go as invited by His brothers. He said the right time (kairos) had not come. For His brothers, they wanted Him to go to the feast to perform miracles to gain honor for Himself. But for Jesus, it was not the right time (moment) to do it. Instead, He went just to teach in the temple courts; no miracle was performed because the moment, the kairos to do it had not yet come. Therefore, there was no contradiction with His brothers.
- In response to peoples’ amazement, Jesus claimed only those who did the will of the Father would understand His teaching was coming from the one who sent Him (verses 16-18). Especially in verse 18, Jesus said, “He who speaks on his own does so to gain honor for himself, but he who works for the honor of the one who sent him is a man of truth, there is nothing false about him. And He openly challenged the Jews in verse 19, “Has not Moses keeps the law. Why are you trying to kill me?’
- The crowd who might be made up of other Jews did not know of the plot against Jesus, and out of their ignorance, they reacted by suggesting that Jesus was demon possessed, paranoid, delusion.
- Jesus now tried to recall how the other Jews first became angry towards Him for healing the invalid on Sabbath day and broke the Mosaic law. Jesus argued back and said the Jews had also broken the Sabbath law by circumcising a child on Sabbath day, it was work and not rest. Circumcision was done to mark the Jewish covenant with God that they are His children in Old Testament.
- Jesus was going for the spirit and not the letter of the law by healing the sick, doing what was needed to help humanity, that was to heal the whole person on the Sabbath (verse 23). This provoked a conspiracy among the general Jews (John 5:1-18).
- It is in this great context, Jesus said in verse 24, “Stop judging by mere appearance, and make a right judgement.” Judging by appearance might be focusing on the letter of the law. Jesus challenged them to think, “Was He wrong by meeting the human need of healing the sick? Was He wrong by going after the spirit of the law?”
- Apostle wrote something very powerful to the Corinthians in 2Cor 3:6, “He has made us competent as ministers of a new covenant – not of the letter, but of the Spirit, for the letter kills, but the Spirit gives life.” Focusing on the letter is to follow word by word which makes things legalistic; focusing on the
Spirit is to see the overall purpose of the law.
- The greek work krino which NIV translated as judge means to distinguish, decide (mentally or judicially). It means by implication, to try, condemn, punish. It is equal to avenge, conclude, damn, decree, determine, go to law, call in question, sentence to.
- In view of the great context, Jesus said, “Make a right judgement.” And I entitled my sermon, “Make a right judgement.” Of course we need to make the right judgement as taught by Jesus. For Jesus, He challenged the Jews to make a right judgement in view of the will of God about Jesus Himself.
- Unfortunately, the Jews made a wrong judgement about the person of Jesus, they judged Him as blaspheming God, disobeying the Sabbath law, and eventually pressurized the government of the day to put Him to death on the cross.
- As I said earlier, all our judgements have consequences.
C. Applications on making judgement.
- Brothers and sisters, for Jesus He made judgement based on the will of the Father; for the Jews they made a judgement based on the letter of the Mosaic Law. For us Christians, what should be the basis of our judgement? It must be the word of God, the whole bible. Do you agree? Therefore, your whole life has to learn and study the bible.
- I always teach that when you face life, you need to face 3 persons: Jesus Christ, others and yourself. Whatever you do, you need to go through 3 persons. You make judgement about anything, you need to ask these 3 persons. And the bottom line of measure of right or wrong, ethical or not, moral or not, valuable or not, worth it or not, will the consequences be positive or not, building up people or not, will it hurt or not, wise or not, are the long term consequences good, must the word of God.
- One guy (a Christian) in his late 20s decided to buy a luxurious car (that was his initial decision and judgement) and he did not have the money to do it. He was persuaded by his friend to approach the power of darkness (to worship certain powerful) to pray to strike lottery tickets. He made a decision and judgement to worship the false god. Then, he really gained stakes of money as this god had blessed him by striking the 4 digit lotter ticket. You see how the devil uses our greed to tempt us. Praise the Lord, the word of God came to him and he realized he was compromising on his faith; he was selling away his life to the devil by worshipping the false God. Upon reflection on the word of God that says “Thou shall not worship the idols.”, he made a decision and the right judgement, then, he burnt all the money. I pray that you see the power of God’s word in making your right judgemnet.
- Let us apply what Jesus is teaching us into the issue of corruption. Corruption is wrong, do you agree? Why? Can anyone here explain why it is wrong in view of the word of God? It is wrong because it encourages both the giver and the receiver to be greedy. It is wrong because it involves abuse of power even to do bad things like denying others a fair chance of competion; concentrating too much wealth in a few hands in a country. When you bribe, you get your license of trading easily; the rakyat have to face the high prices of instructure and even cost of living. At the end of the day, the poor gets poorer, the rich gets richer all the time.
- Let us apply Jesus’ teaching today into finding a life partner today. Make your judgement about what kind of man or lady do you want. Can you make a judgement to choose someone who put greatest priority in obeying Jesus, serving Him and fearing Him with all the godly charaters? Can you not be carried away by his or her ‘thick’ wallet, good career, good look, sweet talk, and all the external appearance that Jesus teaches us?
- Let us apply the teaching today into how you use your time. Do you spend your time for godly purpose? Do you give priority to coming to small group, prayer meeting, spending time with your family members and friends and colleagues who give you positive influence? Can you make a right judgement about who you mix with? I do prison ministry, I find that all prisoners ended up there because they mix with wrong companies?
D. Conclusion
- Can you see why we have to make a right judgement in view of God’s word? When you do so, I believe your whole life from beginning to the end will not be a regret.
- Be humble to do it.
