Cheryl Schatz

Thanks for your participation Mark on our dialog on John 6.

We did start with a little bit from John 5 to set the stage. You mentioned that the Jews wanted to kill Jesus because he broke the Sabbath and He claimed to be equal with God. That is a good addition.

There are several other things about the Jewsh Pharisees that showed why they hated Jesus. Jesus tells us. The conversations with these Jews that should be noted are also in John 5 & John 8. Here is what we know about them:

1. They cannot hear Jesus’ Word because they are of their father the devil and as sons of the devil they want to do the devil’s work. He was a murderer from the beginning and they too want to murder. And because they are of the devil they cannot hear or understand Jesus’ words.

John 8:43–44 (NASB)
43 “Why do you not understand what I am saying? It is because you cannot hear My word.
44 “You are of your father the devil, and you want to do the desires of your father. He was a murderer from the beginning, and does not stand in the truth because there is no truth in him. Whenever he speaks a lie, he speaks from his own nature, for he is a liar and the father of lies.

2. They were ones who do evil and hate the Light. They were unwilling to come to the Light for fear that their deeds would be exposed.

John 3:19–21 (NASB)
19 “This is the judgment, that the Light has come into the world, and men loved the darkness rather than the Light, for their deeds were evil.
20 “For everyone who does evil hates the Light, and does not come to the Light for fear that his deeds will be exposed.
21 “But he who practices the truth comes to the Light, so that his deeds may be manifested as having been wrought in God.”

John 5:40 (NASB)
40 and you are unwilling to come to Me so that you may have life.

3. They were not from God.

John 8:42 Jesus said to them, “If God were your Father, you would love Me, for I proceeded forth and have come from God, for I have not even come on My own initiative, but He sent Me.

John 8:47 “He who is of God hears the words of God; for this reason you do not hear them, because you are not of God.”

4. They are not seekers of God’s glory but they seek glory from man

John 8:44 “How can you believe, when you receive glory from one another and you do not seek the glory that is from the one and only God?

5. They did not believe God’s Word

John 8:46 “For if you believed Moses, you would believe Me, for he wrote about Me.

6. They were not of the truth because all who would not listen to Jesus are not of the truth according to Jesus’ testimony.

John 18:37 (NASB)
37 Therefore Pilate said to Him, “So You are a king?” Jesus answered, “You say correctly that I am a king. For this I have been born, and for this I have come into the world, to testify to the truth. Everyone who is of the truth hears My voice.”

7. Because of all of the things that are said about these Jews in John, we can know that Romans 3 applies to these men:

Romans 3:10–18 (NASB)
10 as it is written,
“THERE IS NONE RIGHTEOUS, NOT EVEN ONE;
11 THERE IS NONE WHO UNDERSTANDS,
THERE IS NONE WHO SEEKS FOR GOD;
12 ALL HAVE TURNED ASIDE, TOGETHER THEY HAVE BECOME USELESS;
THERE IS NONE WHO DOES GOOD,
THERE IS NOT EVEN ONE.”
13 “THEIR THROAT IS AN OPEN GRAVE,
WITH THEIR TONGUES THEY KEEP DECEIVING,”
“THE POISON OF ASPS IS UNDER THEIR LIPS”;
14 “WHOSE MOUTH IS FULL OF CURSING AND BITTERNESS”;
15 “THEIR FEET ARE SWIFT TO SHED BLOOD,
16 DESTRUCTION AND MISERY ARE IN THEIR PATHS,
17 AND THE PATH OF PEACE THEY HAVE NOT KNOWN.”
18 “THERE IS NO FEAR OF GOD BEFORE THEIR EYES.”

They are of the ones who do not seek God, they are not righteous but are evil, they do not understand, their feet are swift to shed blood, they do not know the path of peace and there is no fear of God in them and because of of this, destruction is in their path.

Yet even with all of this terrible stuff said about the Jewish Pharisees, Jesus still said that the words He was saying were said so that they may be saved.

John 5:34 (NASB)
34 “But the testimony which I receive is not from man, but I say these things so that you may be saved.

The will of God was for the Jews to repent and to believe Jesus so that they could be saved.

Mark, your words about John 5:39-47 were good. The one point of contention is this:

However i reject Cheryl’s point that these Jews have no ‘fear’ of God. THis is not in the text anywhere.

While it is not directly said in the text, the things said about these Jews match up exactly with what is said of those who do not hear God, do not seek for Him, whose works are evil, who do not understand and who are murderers and do not fear God. Romans 3:10-18 fits them to a tee.

If you still believe that these Jews were ones who feared God, it would be helpful to show from the text where this fear of God showed up.

Mark, you said:

These Jews were pious and religious. They searched the scriptures looking for eternal life.

They may have been pious, but they didn’t believe the Scriptures that they were searching and their pious outside was called a white washed tomb by Jesus.

Matthew 23:27 (NASB)
27 “Woe to you, scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites! For you are like whitewashed tombs which on the outside appear beautiful, but inside they are full of dead men’s bones and all uncleanness.

Under John 6, you said:

Verse 1- ’some time after this’ is indefinate. This means that the events of Chapter 6 may or may not have happened immediately after chapter 5. Some commentator think it could be as much as 6 months, but that is a side issue.

The preposition that joins the dialog of Jesus with the Jews in chapter 5 with the events of chapter 6 most certainly is joined together because the Greek word that is used to join the two means:

3. marker of attendant circumstances of someth. that takes place, with
   Arndt, W., Danker, F. W., & Bauer, W. (2000). A Greek-English lexicon of the New Testament and other early Christian literature (3rd ed.) (637).

It is a an attendant circumstance that follows and so we can confidently know that what happened in chapter 6 is going to be related to the attendant circumstances of chapter 5.

You also said:

What is important to note is the ‘crowd’ is not the same Jews addressed in chapter 5. We know this because the Jews of chapter 5 did not recognise Jesus authority.

But there are two groups in chapter 6. The first group is the “crowd” that was following Jesus because of the miracles. The second group shows up in verse 41 as having problems with Jesus. They are not called the crowd but “the Jews”.

You said:

The crowd of 6:1-15 however were different.

Yes, the crowd of verses 1 – 15 were not the Pharisees who had challenged Jesus.

You said:

It seems evcident that the ‘crowd’ is looking for a new ‘Moses’ to deliver them from the Roman bondage. This seems true once we see the reaction of the people post miracle and Jesus response.

Yes, good work.

You said:

The mention of ‘passover’ is theological not chronological.

I am not sure I understand you. Are you saying that the Passover that was said to be near in verse 4 is really not a proper passover?

John 6:4 (NASB)
4 Now the Passover, the feast of the Jews, was near.