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Commentary Index | Return to PrayerRequest.com | DownloadPaul Kretzmann Commentary - John 7:14 - 7:19
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The appearance of Jesus at the festival:
v. 14. Now about the midst of the feast Jesus went up into the Temple and taught.
v. 15. And the Jews marveled, saying, How knoweth this man letters, having never learned?
v. 16. Jesus answered them and said, My doctrine is not Mine, but His that sent Me.
v. 17. If any man will do His will, he shall know of the doctrine whether it be of God, or whether I speak of Myself.
v. 18. He that speaketh of himself seeketh his own glory; but He that seeketh His glory that sent Him, the same is true, and no unrighteousness is in Him.
v. 19. Did not Moses give you the Law, and yet none of you keepeth the Law? Why go ye about to kill Me?
Since the atmosphere was now cleared of any danger of a carnal uprising, Jesus felt no hesitation about going up to the Temple about the middle of the festival-week and doing His work as Teacher, attending to the duties of His prophetic office. He did this in the face of Jewish hostility, because it was part of the labor of love which He had come to perform, though His human nature may have had scruples and fears. "St. John describes this for consolation, that no one should concern himself about it and worry, if God gives Himself the semblance of weakness and the world glories and boasts; you must get used to it; also, if the Christians, but especially the preachers, are weak and shy, and their adversaries, the great, powerful men, paw and threaten. That is nothing new, and it does not happen only to us, but the prophets and apostles had the same experience that they seemed weak before the tyrants, but in their weakness they were strongest; yea, it happened thus even to Christ the Lord, who is a Lord of all prophets and apostles. He feigns weakness, just as though He wanted to give up His office of preaching and not be obedient to God, and as though He were badly terrified; while He, in that same weakness, went directly forward. " Not only the fact that Jesus taught, but especially the content of His teaching surprised the Jews. They asked one another where this man had gotten His knowledge. He had not taken the course which was prescribed for the regular scribes and rabbis, and yet He could teach. "The Jewish learning consisted in the knowledge of their own Scriptures and the traditions of their elders. In this learning our blessed Lord excelled. No person ever spoke with more grace and dignity, or knew better how to make a more proper use, or a happier application, of Jewish allegories and parables; because none ever penetrated the sense of the Scriptures as He did; none ever cited them more successfully, or ever showed their accomplishment in so complete and satisfactory a manner. As these branches of learning were taught at the Jewish schools, and our Lord had never attended there, they were astonished to find Him excelling in that sort of learning, of which they themselves professed to be the sole teachers. " Jesus gave the Jews an explanation of this wonderful feat. The teaching which He delivered before them had its source not in His own knowledge, but in Him that sent Him. He was not giving them a summary of human ideas and philosophy, but the eternal truth of His heavenly Father. Note the careful way in which Christ expresses Himself: it is His doctrine, and yet it is not His doctrine. What He was teaching was the truth, and He delivered it with the firm conviction of its eternal truth; and incidentally it was the revelation of the innermost essence of God. This same conviction must live in the heart of every true preacher of the Gospel. "In the same manner I say also: The Gospel is mine, to distinguish it from the doctrine of all other preachers that otherwise do not hold my doctrine. Therefore I say: This is mine, Luther's, doctrine; and yet I say also: It is not my doctrine, it is not in my hand, but it is the gift of God. For I did not invent it out of my head, it did not grow in my garden, nor bubble up out of my fountain, nor was it born out of me; but it is God's gift, and not an invention of men. Thus both sayings are true: The doctrine is mine, and yet it is not mine, for it is God's, the heavenly Father's, and yet I preach and teach such doctrine."
Jesus now suggests to the Jews a test by which they may try out the truth of His doctrine. The Jews were always boasting of the Law, of the will of God. Here was a chance to put the claims of Jesus to a test. They should take the will of God and earnestly begin the practice of it, they should bend all their efforts toward fulfilling the Law. The first result of such endeavor would be that they must realize their utter inability to keep it properly. Every one that tries to merit salvation by keeping the will of God in the Law will soon come to the conclusion that it is beyond human ability. Only the doctrine of Jesus, the Gospel, will give strength to fulfill the will of God. And there from will follow the second conclusion, that. the doctrine of Jesus must be from God, that He has divine authority for His teaching and does not present His own philosophy. Jesus here places Himself in direct contrast to preachers that preach their own wisdom. There are such that preach their own mind, teach their own ideas, and they have only one aim: they strive after their own glory. That is true of all the modern so-called preachers that feed the people the husks of their own religious systems, that, have discourses on every question under the sun but that which has reference to the salvation of their hearers. There is no honor and glory before men in preaching the old-fashioned Gospel of the forgiveness of sins through the merits of Christ, and therefore these preachers select such topics as will give them opportunity to display their wit or their learning, or the absence of both. They want a great name before men, and cheap notoriety they usually achieve. But with Christ (and with all true Christian preachers) it is different. Christ is seeking the glory of God, therefore He is true, sure, faithful, dependable, and there is no unrighteousness in Him. Only one that leads a morally blameless life is properly a preacher of divine truth, only he will work in the right manner for the glory of God. But the Jews, far from practicing the will of God and living up to its injunctions, did not keep the Law. Their leaders were even then making plans to remove Jesus, to put Him out of the way by murdering Him. The Jews are a picture of all self-righteous people in the world. They insist upon outward order, piety and right moral living, but they are opposed to the doctrine of Christ. But this attitude proves that they are not sincere in their pretensions. If they would make an honest effort to fulfill the entire Law in all its mandates and implications, they would find out how utterly helpless they are, and would turn to the Gospel as the one means of salvation. It is only he that accepts the Gospel and believes its glorious message that can hope in any way to fulfill the will of God.