37  Rejecting the Claims of Christ  (John 10:22–42)

At that time the Feast of the Dedication took place at Jerusalem; it was winter, and Jesus was walking in the temple in the portico of Solomon. The Jews then gathered around Him, and were saying to Him, “How long will You keep us in suspense? If You are the Christ, tell us plainly.” Jesus answered them, “I told you, and you do not believe; the works that I do in My Father’s name, these testify of Me. But you do not believe because you are not of My sheep. My sheep hear My voice, and I know them, and they follow Me; and I give eternal life to them, and they will never perish; and no one will snatch them out of My hand. My Father, who has given them to Me, is greater than all; and no one is able to snatch them out of the Father’s hand. I and the Father are one.” The Jews picked up stones again to stone Him. Jesus answered them, “I showed you many good works from the Father; for which of them are you stoning Me?” The Jews answered Him, “For a good work we do not stone You, but for blasphemy; and because You, being a man, make Yourself out to be God.” Jesus answered them, “Has it not been written in your Law, ‘I said, you are gods’? If he called them gods, to whom the word of God came (and the Scripture cannot be broken), do you say of Him, whom the Father sanctified and sent into the world, ‘You are blaspheming,’ because I said, ‘I am the Son of God’? If I do not do the works of My Father, do not believe Me; but if I do them, though you do not believe Me, believe the works, so that you may know and understand that the Father is in Me, and I in the Father.” Therefore they were seeking again to seize Him, and He eluded their grasp. And He went away again beyond the Jordan to the place where John was first baptizing, and He was staying there. Many came to Him and were saying, “While John performed no sign, yet everything John said about this man was true.” Many believed in Him there. (10:22–42)

This passage marks the end of John’s presentation of Christ’s public ministry. For more than three years, Jesus had traveled the length and breadth of Israel, preaching the gospel, calling for repentance, confronting hypocritical false religion, instructing His disciples, and performing countless signs and wonders, which confirmed that He was the Messiah. Through both His words and His works, Jesus had clearly demonstrated His deity and equality with God.

But tragically the nation of Israel, led by her religious leaders, rejected the Messiah—just as the Old Testament predicted would happen (cf. Ps. 22:6–8; Isa. 49:7; 50:6; 53:3). At the end of His life, Jesus had a mere handful of genuine followers; the Bible mentions 120 in Jerusalem (Acts 1:15), and several hundred more, probably in Galilee (1 Cor. 15:6; cf. Matt. 28:7, 16). Instead of embracing Him as their long-awaited Redeemer King, the people of Israel “nailed [Him] to a cross by the hands of godless men and put Him to death” (Acts 2:23). As noted in previous chapters of this volume, the nation’s rejection of Jesus is a frequent theme in John’s gospel (cf. 1:10–11; 3:32; 4:1–3; 5:16–18; 6:41–43, 66; 7:1, 20, 26–27, 30–52; 8:13–59; 9:16, 24, 29, 40–41; 10:20; 11:46–57; 12:37–40).

In keeping with that theme, in the concluding section of chapter 10 John punctuates the long presentation of our Lord’s public ministry (which began in 1:35) with yet another confrontation between Jesus and the Jewish religious leaders. The dialogue between them unfolds in five scenes: the confrontation, the claim, the charge, the challenge, and the consequences.

THE CONFRONTATION

At that time the Feast of the Dedication took place at Jerusalem; it was winter, and Jesus was walking in the temple in the portico of Solomon. The Jews then gathered around Him, and were saying to Him, “How long will You keep us in suspense? If You are the Christ, tell us plainly.” (10:22–24)

John’s note that it was now the time of the Feast of the Dedication sets the stage for the next episode. There is a gap of approximately two months between verse 21 (which is still set at the time of the Feast of Tabernacles [7:2, 10, 37]) and verse 22. Some commentators think that Jesus left Jerusalem during that two-month period, since verse 22 calls attention to Jerusalem again as the setting for this dialogue. Others believe the Lord remained in the vicinity of Jerusalem, since verse 22 does not say that He went up to Jerusalem—the usual wording for going to the city from another region (cf. 2:13; 5:1; 11:55; Matt. 20:17–18; Luke 2:22; 19:28; Acts 11:2; 15:2; 21:12, 15; 24:11; 25:1, 9; Gal. 1:17–18). Both views are only speculative, since the gospels do not say where Jesus was during those two months.

Known today as Hanukkah, or the Feast of Lights (because of the lamps and candles lit in Jewish homes as part of the celebration), the Feast of the Dedication was celebrated on the twenty-fifth day of the Jewish month Chislev (Nov.–Dec). It was not one of the feasts prescribed in the Old Testament, but originated during the intertestamental period. The feast commemorated the Israelites’ victory over the infamous Syrian king Antiochus Epiphanes (175–164 B.C.). A devotee of Greek culture, Antiochus, in a decree given by him in 167 B.C., sought to impose it on his subjects (a process known as Hellenization). Antiochus captured Jerusalem and desecrated the temple (170 B.C.) by sacrificing a pig on the altar, setting up a pagan altar in its place, and erecting a statue of Zeus in the most holy place. As he attempted to systematically stamp out Judaism, Antiochus brutally oppressed the Jews, who clung tenaciously to their religion. Under his despotic direction, the Jews were required to offer sacrifices to pagan gods; they were not allowed to own or read the Old Testament Scriptures, and copies of it were destroyed; and they were forbidden to perform such mandatory religious practices as observing the Sabbath and circumcising children. Antiochus was the first pagan king to persecute the Jews for their religion (cf. Dan. 8:9–14, 23–25; 11:21–35).

Antiochus’ savage persecution caused the pious Jews to rise in revolt, led by a priest named Mattathias and his sons. After three years of guerilla warfare the Jews, under the brilliant military leadership of Judas Maccabeus (the son of Mattathias), were able to retake Jerusalem. On 25 Chislev 164 B.C., they liberated the temple, rededicated it, and established the Feast of Dedication. The apocryphal book of 2 Maccabees recounts an historical version of the story:

The Feast of Dedication, which celebrated the successful revolt, took place in winter, which may explain why Jesus, who was walking in the temple, was specifically in the portico of Solomon. It was probably cold, and may have been raining, since winter is the rainy season in Palestine. The portico of Solomon would have provided a measure of protection from the elements; it was a roofed colonnade supported by pillars, located on the east side of the temple area and overlooking the Kidron Valley below. Many people frequented the site, especially in inclement weather. Some walked there to meditate, and rabbis sometimes taught their students there. Later, the early Christians would gather in the portico of Solomon to proclaim the gospel (Acts 3:11;5:12).

Some see in John’s reference to winter a metaphor for the Jews’ spiritual state—that it described not only the season of the year, but also Israel’s spiritual coldness. “The thoughtful reader of the Gospel understands that time and temperature notations in John are reflections of the spiritual condition of the persons in the stories (cf. 3:2; 13:30; 18:18; 20:1, 19; 21:3–4)” (Gerald L. Borchert, John 1–11, The New American Commentary [Nashville: Broadman & Holman, 2002], 337–38).

The hostile Jews accosted the Lord (the verb weakly translated gathered around literally means “to surround,” or “to encircle” [cf. Luke 21:20; Acts 14:20; Heb. 11:30]) and demanded of Him, “How long will You keep us in suspense? If You are the Christ, tell us plainly.” By asking Jesus if He was the Messiah, the Jewish leaders were certainly asking the right question; indeed, it is the most significant question anyone can ask (cf. Matt. 16:15–16). But given the revelation they had seen and heard, and their hostility to Jesus over the course of that revelation, their motive was suspect. Far from being an honest request for information, their inquiry was actually just another attempt to trap Jesus with a view to getting rid of Him. Because He was the greatest threat to their power and prestige, they were desperately looking for a way to discredit Him and dispose of Him altogether. They were unsettled by the miraculous signs He performed (11:47); tired of the divisions He caused (Luke 12:51–53), even within their own ranks (cf. 9:16); fearful of the revolt He might spark against Rome, which would jeopardize their privileged political status (11:48); angered by His public rebuke of their hypocrisy (e.g., Matt. 23:1–36); and, most of all, outraged by His unapologetic claim to be God (5:18; 10:33; 19:7). The Jewish authorities’ strategy was to make Him declare publicly (the verb translated plainly can also be translated “publicly,” or “openly” [7:4, 13, 26; 11:54; 18:20]) that He was the Messiah, so that they would have a pretext for arresting Him.

THE CLAIM

Jesus answered them, “I told you, and you do not believe; the works that I do in My Father’s name, these testify of Me. But you do not believe because you are not of My sheep. My sheep hear My voice, and I know them, and they follow Me; and I give eternal life to them, and they will never perish; and no one will snatch them out of My hand. My Father, who has given them to Me, is greater than all; and no one is able to snatch them out of the Father’s hand. I and the Father are one.” The Jews picked up stones again to stone Him. (10:25–31)

But Jesus already had told them plainly who He was (cf. 5:17ff.; 8:12, 24, 58); in fact, He had spent the last three years doing so. Not only that, the works that He did in the Father’s name also demonstrated that He was the Messiah; the Son of God; God in human flesh (cf. vv. 32, 38; 3:2; 5:36; 7:31; 11:47; 14:11; Acts 2:22). The Lord’s twice-repeated declaration, you do not believe, indicates that the problem was not due to any ambiguity in the revelation of the truth, but rather to their spiritual blindness. They lacked understanding, not because they lacked information, but because they lacked repentance and faith. Their unbelief was not due to insufficient exposure to the truth, but to their hatred of the truth and love of sin and lies (John 3:19–21). Anyone who willingly seeks the truth will find it (7:17), but Jesus refused to commit Himself to those who willfully rejected the truth. Had He again given them the plain answer they were demanding, they would not have believed Him anyway (cf. 8:43; Matt. 26:63–65; Luke 22:66–67).

From the perspective of human responsibility, the hostile Jews did not believe because they had deliberately rejected the truth. But from the standpoint of divine sovereignty, they did not believe because they were not of the Lord’s sheep, which were given Him by the Father (v. 29; 6:37; 17:2, 6, 9). A full understanding of exactly how those two realities, human responsibility and divine sovereignty, work together lies beyond human comprehension; but there is no difficulty with them in the infinite mind of God. Significantly, the Bible does not attempt to harmonize them, nor does it apologize for the logical tension between them. For example, speaking of Judas Iscariot’s treachery, Jesus said in Luke 22:22, “The Son of Man is going [to be betrayed] as it has been determined.” In other words, Judas’s betrayal of Christ was in accord with God’s eternal purpose. But then Jesus added, “Woe to that man by whom He is betrayed!” That Judas’s betrayal was part of God’s plan did not relieve him of the responsibility for his crime. In Acts 2:23 Peter said that Jesus was “delivered over [to the cross] by the predetermined plan and foreknowledge of God.” Yet he also charged Israel with responsibility for having “nailed [Jesus] to a cross by the hands of godless men and put Him to death.” God’s sovereignty never excuses human sin. (For a more complete discussion of the interplay of divine sovereignty and human responsibility, see the exposition of 6:35–40 in chapter 20 of this volume.)

Repeating what He said in His discourse on the Good Shepherd (see the exposition of vv. 3–5 in the previous chapter of this volume), Jesus said, “My sheep hear My voice, and I know them, and they follow Me.” The elect will heed Christ’s call to salvation and continue in faith and obedience to eternal glory (cf. Rom. 8:29–30).

The Lord continued by articulating the wonderful truth that those who are His sheep need never fear being lost. “I give eternal life to them,” Jesus declared, “and they will never perish; and no one will snatch them out of My hand. My Father, who has given them to Me, is greater than all; and no one is able to snatch them out of the Father’s hand.” Nowhere in Scripture is there a stronger affirmation of the absolute eternal security of all true Christians. Jesus plainly taught that the security of the believer in salvation does not depend on human effort, but is grounded in the gracious, sovereign election, promise, and power of God.

Christ’s words reveal seven realities that bind every true Christian forever to God. First, believers are His sheep, and it is the duty of the Good Shepherd to protect His flock.”This is the will of Him who sent Me,” Jesus said, “that of all that He has given Me I lose nothing, but raise it up on the last day” (6:39). To insist that a true Christian can somehow be lost is to deny the truth of that statement. It is also to defame the character of the Lord Jesus Christ—making Him out to be an incompetent shepherd, unable to hold on to those entrusted to Him by the Father.

Second, Christ’s sheep hear only His voice and follow only Him. Since they will not listen to or follow a stranger (10:5), they could not possibly wander away from Him and be eternally lost.

Third, Christ’s sheep have eternal life. To speak of eternal life ending is a contradiction in terms.

Fourth, Christ gives eternal life to His sheep. Since they did nothing to earn it, they can do nothing to lose it.

Fifth, Christ promised that His sheep will never perish. Were even one to do so, it would make Him a liar.

Sixth, no one—not false shepherds (the thieves and robbers of v. 1), or false prophets (symbolized by the wolf of v. 12), nor even the Devil himself—is powerful enough to snatch Christ’s sheep out of His hand.

Finally, Christ’s sheep are held not only in His hand, but also in the hand of the Father, who is greater than all; and thus no one is able to snatch them out of His hand either. Infinitely secure, the believer’s “life is hidden with Christ in God” (Col. 3:3).

The Father and the Son jointly guarantee the eternal security of believers because, as Jesus declared, “I and the Father are one” (the Greek word one is neuter, not masculine; it speaks of “one substance,” not “one person”). Thus their unity of purpose and action in safeguarding believers is undergirded by their unity of nature and essence. The whole matter of security is summarized in our Lord’s own words in John 6:39–40:

Incensed by what they accurately and unmistakably perceived as another blasphemous claim to deity by Jesus, the Jews, self-righ-teously exploding in a fit of passion, picked up stones again to stone Him—the fourth time in John’s gospel that they had attempted to kill Him (5:16–18; 7:1; 8:59). Though the Romans had withheld the right of capital punishment from the Jews (18:31), this angry lynch mob was ready to take matters into its own hands.

THE CHARGE

Jesus answered them, “I showed you many good works from the Father; for which of them are you stoning Me?” The Jews answered Him, “For a good work we do not stone You, but for blasphemy; and because You, being a man, make Yourself out to be God.” (10:32–33)

Showing majestic calm in the face of His opponents’ murderous rage, Jesus asked them pointedly, “I showed you many good (the adjective kalos means “noble,” “excellent,” or “beautiful”) works from the Father; for which of them are you stoning Me?” The Lord did not soften or withdraw His claim to be equal with God. Instead, He forced them to face and deal with His miraculous good works done at the direction of the Father (cf. 5:19–23). Those works offered visible, tangible, and inescapable proof of His oneness with God (cf. 5:36), and thus proved that He was not a blasphemer, as, in fact, His opponents were. The Lord’s question also put the Jewish leaders in the awkward position of opposing the very public and popular good things He had done in healing the sick, feeding the hungry, liberating the demon-possessed, and even raising the dead (cf. Luke 7:14–15;8:52–56; John 11).

But the enraged Jews were not deterred by any miracles. Unlike the formerly blind man, who had drawn the proper conclusion from Jesus’ miraculous deeds (cf. 9:33), the angry mob simply brushed His works aside. They answered Him, “For a good work we do not stone You, but for blasphemy; and because You, being a man, make Yourself out to be God.” As noted above, the signs Jesus’ performed demonstrated His oneness with the Father, and proved that He was not guilty of blasphemy. But the Lord’s appeal to His mighty works was lost on those in the crowd. Their minds were made up, and their love of sin held them captive to Satan, death, and judgment.

In contrast to those who deny that Christ ever actually claimed to be God, the hostile Jews understood perfectly that He was saying exactly that. But they refused to consider the possibility that His claim might be true. In their minds, Jesus was guilty of the ultimate act of blasphemy because, as they told Him, “You, being a man, make Yourself out to be God.” As was the case with Jesus’ earlier claims to deity, their ultimate reaction was a plot to kill Him (5:16–18; 8:58–59). Ironically, their charge of blasphemy was the reverse of the truth. Far from being a mere man who was arrogantly promoting himself as God, Jesus was in fact almighty God who had selflessly humbled Himself in becoming a man to die for the world (1:14; cf. Phil. 2:5–11).

THE CHALLENGE

Jesus answered them, “Has it not been written in your Law, ‘I said, you are gods’? If he called them gods, to whom the word of God came (and the Scripture cannot be broken), do you say of Him, whom the Father sanctified and sent into the world, ‘You are blaspheming,’ because I said, ‘I am the Son of God’? If I do not do the works of My Father, do not believe Me; but if I do them, though you do not believe Me, believe the works, so that you may know and understand that the Father is in Me, and I in the Father.” (10:34–38)

It is important to note that Jesus, having been charged with blasphemy because His opponents knew exactly what He was claiming, did not claim that they had misunderstood Him. His refusal to do so makes it clear that His declaration, “I and the Father are one” (v. 30), was in fact what they knew it to be, a claim to be God.

Jesus knew how seriously they took the very word God, so He addressed that one matter by quoting a passage from the Old Testament: “Has it not been written in your Law, ‘I said, you are gods’? If he called them gods, to whom the word of God came (and the Scripture cannot be broken), do you say of Him, whom the Father sanctified and sent into the world, ‘You are blaspheming,’ because I said, ‘I am the Son of God’? The very Law (a reference here to the entire Old Testament, not just the Pentateuch) that the Jews prized so highly used the term gods to refer to others than God Himself. The reference is to Psalm 82:6, where God rebuked Israel’s unjust judges, calling them gods (in a far lesser sense) because they ruled as His representatives and spokesmen (cf. Ex. 4:16; 7:1). The Jewish leaders could not dispute the fact that those judges were called gods, because the Scripture cannot be broken—a clear and unambiguous declaration of the absolute authority and inerrancy of the Bible. Scripture can never be nullified or set aside (see the discussion of Matt. 5:17–19 in Matthew 1–7, The MacArthur New Testament Commentary [Chicago: Moody 1985], 249–273), though the Jews often tried (cf. Mark 7:13).

Since God called the unjust judges gods, Jesus’ argument ran, how could His opponents say of Him, whom the Father sanctified and sent into the world, “You are blaspheming,” because He said, “I am the Son of God?” If mere men, who were evil, could in some sense be called gods, how could it be inappropriate for Jesus, the One whom the Father sanctified and sent into the world, to call Himself the Son of God (cf. 5:19–27)? The point is not to add to the evidence of His deity; it is simply a rebuke on the level of their overreaction to the use of the word God in reference to Jesus. He had proven that He was entitled to that title in the full divine sense, as He would affirm again in vv. 37–38. They were merely those to whom the word of God came; Jesus was the Incarnate Word of God (1:1, 14). As one commentator further explains,

The Lord’s appeal to the Old Testament was a challenge again for the Jewish leaders to abandon their biased conclusions about Him and consider the objective evidence. In that same vein Jesus continued by saying, “If I do not do the works of My Father, do not believe Me; but if I do them, though you do not believe Me, believe the works, so that you may know and understand that the Father is in Me, and I in the Father.” As He had so many other times before, with annoying patience (cf. vv. 25, 32; 5:19–20, 36; 14:10–11) the Lord appealed to His works as proof of His indivisible union with the Father (v. 30). But incredibly, the religious leaders of Israel were so spiritually blind that they could not recognize God’s works. If Jesus did not do the works of the Father, they would have been right in refusing to believe Him. On the other hand, because He did do them, they should have put aside their reluctance to believe His words, and chosen instead to believe the clear testimony of His works. As supposed men of God, they should have been willing to follow the evidence to its logical conclusion.

THE CONSEQUENCES

Therefore they were seeking again to seize Him, and He eluded their grasp. And He went away again beyond the Jordan to the place where John was first baptizing, and He was staying there. Many came to Him and were saying, “While John performed no sign, yet everything John said about this man was true.” Many believed in Him there. (10:39–42)

Not unexpectedly, the Lord’s challenge to His opponents fell on deaf ears. Instead of considering the evidence, the Jewish leaders responded as they had before by seeking again to seize Him. It may be that they were planning to haul Him out of the temple before stoning Him (cf. Acts 21:30–32), but more likely they meant to arrest Him and hold Him for trial before the Sanhedrin. No matter what they intended, His hour still had not come (7:30; 8:20), so Jesus eluded their grasp. He left Jerusalem, not to return until three or four months later to raise Lazarus from the dead (John 11:1ff.) and enter Jerusalem in triumph (12:12ff.).

But as always, there were some who believed and embraced Him (cf. vv. 19–21; 7:12, 43; 9:16; 11:45). After leaving Jerusalem, the Lord

went away again beyond the Jordan to the place where John was first baptizing (Bethany beyond the Jordan; see the exposition of 1:28 in chapter 4 of this volume). While He was staying there many came to Him and were saying, “While John performed no sign, yet everything John said about this man was true.” The people there remembered Him and came to Him as they had earlier flocked to John the Baptist. While John performed no sign, that is to say did no miracles, he was nonetheless the preeminent witness to Jesus; as the people noted, “Everything John said about Him was true.” Not surprisingly, many believed in Him there.

So Jesus’ public ministry closed with one last rejection by the very leaders who should have hailed Him as the Messiah. Their rejection foreshadowed His final rejection a few months later, when the people, under their influence (Matt. 27:20), “cried out, Away with Him, away with Him, crucify Him!’” (John 19:15).

Even today, there are many who, like the hostile Jewish nation, allow their preconceived ideas about religion and their love for sin to blind them to the saving truth about Jesus Christ. Nonetheless those who are drawn to Him in repentance and faith will come to know the truth of who He is (7:17). To them will be given “the right to become children of God, even to those who believe in His name” (1:12).