Jesus Revealed Pt. 7 - The UnexpectedSample

When Jesus Is Not What We Expect  

Thoughts on the Passage

Jesus makes people deal with tough issues. Jesus also exposes people’s bias – things they require of the Messiah that are not biblical truth.

Jesus must come from Bethlehem – not Galilee.
Jesus must be accepted by the religious leaders first before He can be considered the Messiah.
Jesus does not need a hearing – He is from Galilee, and nothing good comes from Galilee.

Not everyone agrees with these concerns. Some accept Jesus even though He was from Galilee (actually, Jesus was born in Bethlehem; all they had to do was ask!). Nicodemus followed Jesus secretly – he was one of the religious leaders in Jerusalem. Elisha, an old Testament prophet, came from the Galilee area, so a prophet DID come from there – they just did not believe the Messiah could come from there. So each of these arguments did not stop people from listening to Jesus, recognizing His words as truth, and choosing to follow Him. All the other people used poor excuses to justify their reason for rejecting Jesus.

It still happens today.

Jesus challenges people with His claims as the Son of God who died for their sins and is the only way to eternal life. Many people respond with reasons why they cannot accept this, but it exposes their biases. Their reasons do not need to be correct; they just believe them to be true. That is all that they worry about.

 

John is writing this to challenge all of us to be careful. We all accept things as factual that are not correct. When it comes to Jesus, that is dangerous; Jesus is the Son of God. To not carefully check out this claim is foolish.

Application

Take time today and ask God to reveal anything that we believe that needs to be checked out more carefully. We all have things in our beliefs that are incorrect.

Here are a couple that we might consider:
-- the most important thing is hard work and success rather than obedience.
-- I know I need to give as God commands, but it will have to wait until I can afford to do it.
-- I know I should love this person as God loves him, but it is best that I just ignore him and leave him alone.
-- what I have to give God is so small that it has very little value – no one will ever miss it.

Time to Pray

Father, as I read this passage again, I see how easy it is to have incorrect thinking – and truly believe I am right. Good people rejected Jesus because their understanding was faulty. Even when they had their thinking challenged, they refused to accept it. I see it even today. I know my own heart as well – it is hidden inside me somewhere. I hold to things that I am comfortable believing, I hold to things I do not want to give up, or I hold to things that protect my standing or my honor – but they are not true to Your word. Today, I ask that You expose them and give me a heart willing to change. In Jesus’ name, Amen.