Words of Jesus Podcast - Why Do You Go About To Kill Me

Episode Date: October 13, 2023

Jesus lived in humility and meekness, as the example of what God wants for us. We might think our actions would have been different than the religious leaders in Jesus' day. The understanding and authority of Jesus' instruction was a surprise. The spoken truth was inarguable. But, it was not what they expected. Those who taught in the yeshivas and synagogues and walked physically with Jesus had difficulty fitting His life into the expectations of Messiah. ***Ch. 54: Jesus At The Feast Of TabernaclesJohn 7:1-8:59Jesus Rejects The Advice of His Brothers To Go To JerusalemWhen the Feast of the Tabernacles was at hand, Jesus’ brothers said to him:            “Depart hence, and go into Judea, that thy disciples also may see the works that thou doest. For there is no man that doeth anything in secret, if he himself seeketh to be known openly. If thou do these things, show thyself to the world.”            Even his brothers did not believe in him.            Jesus replied to his advisers:            “My time is not yet come; but your time is always ready. The world cannot hate you; but me it hateth, because I testify of it, that the works thereof are evil. Go ye up unto this feast. I go not up yet unto this feast; for my time is not yet fullcome.”            And Jesus continued yet a while in Galilee. But, after his brothers had left for Jerusalem, he also went to the feast, not openly but secretly.Jesus Defeats An Attempt To Arrest Him            The authorities, suspecting that Jesus was in the city, asked:            “Where is he?”            The people murmured about him. Some said:            “He is a good man.”             Others said:            “Nay, but he deceiveth the people.”            However, all were afraid to speak openly of Jesus, for fear of the authorities.  About the middle of the feast Jesus went into the temple and taught. Many people, surprised at his words, said:            “How knoweth this man letters, having never learned?”            Jesus answered them saying:            “My doctrine is not mine, but his that sent me. If any man will do his will, he shall know of the doctrine, whether it be of God, or whether I speak of myself. 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. Did not Moses give you the law, and yet none of you keepeth the law? Why ye go about to kill me?”            The people answered:            “Thou hast a devil. Who goeth about to kill thee?”            Jesus replied:            “I have done one work, and ye all marvel. Moses therefore gave unto you circumcision; (not because it is of...

Think Red Ink Ministries presents the Words of Jesus series with Don C. Harris. Hello friend, welcome once again to the Words of Jesus series. I'm Don Harris, your host, and we're going to be talking again today from the 54th chapter and talking about Jesus going to the Feast of Tabernacles. This particular portion is about where people were discussing his particular ministry. And these things are coming from John 7. And I assure you that it would really behoove you to read

John's Gospel. Especially after we have covered as much as we have in this book on the Red Letters. You've got a good foundation right now of understanding why Jesus did what he did. You're going to be amazed as you read John and understand. You're going to hear Jesus say things that you've known all of your life, and all of a sudden it's going to be a little different to you because I think what we're developing within ourself

is a recognizable and familial and familiar relationship with our Lord Jesus Christ. And he starts to explain some things in here that I think are good for us. Let's go back to the reading that we did last time. Get up to speed. The authorities, suspecting that Jesus was in the city, asked, where is he? The people murmured about him. Some said, he's a good man. And others said, nay, but he

deceiveth the people. However, all were afraid to speak openly of Jesus for fear of the authorities. About the middle of the feast Jesus went into the temple and taught. Many people surprised at his words said, how knoweth this man letters having never learned? Jesus answered them in saying, let's back up just a minute. I think this is interesting. I've often wondered, and I can get no satisfaction one way or the other, when these people are saying, how knoweth this man letters? I think he's asking, I think there's a couple of ways of looking at it.

One of them is, who taught this guy to read? I don't remember this guy ever learning to read. Did you see him in school? No. Was he in your yeshiva? No, he wasn't in mine. Well, how does he know this stuff? It's one way of understanding, you know, how does he know how to read?

How is it he can read these scrolls like he does? Because nobody's ever taught him. The other way of looking at this is how does this man understand what he reads so well? Because he's not been around people to teach him what these things mean. Which I think is more likely what was being asked. Because he would read a scripture and then expound on it and when he was done

the people were amazed, not that he was necessarily a great reader or a good orator or he spoke nice and clearly or he stood up straight, but that he spoke with one as one having authority and not as the scribes. Now that's an interesting thing to think about for a couple of different reasons. One of them was when there is authority, you hardly even have to ask where it's been placed or who has it or anything about it. It's pretty obvious who is in authority.

And Jesus exuded this idea that he was in authority. Friend, it's because that he was in authority. Friend, it's because he really was in authority. Now, he could have come to this earth and lorded that authority over us and got exactly what he wanted. He could have made us into a whole world full of trained monkeys if that's what he wanted to do. But what he did was, is he came here, showed his authority, and said, this is what I want for you. This is the direction I want you to go. He was looking for that volunteer

type of thing. Well, in mankind, in the world we live in today, when somebody gets authority, the first thing they want to do is to lord it over people. And this was peculiar about him. He was as humble as he could be. He was as meek as he could be. Yet, when he speaks, he speaks with more authority than all the church leadership combined. He was an amazing person to listen to. And it wasn't because, like I say, of his vocabulary, his ability to put together a nice sentence with no dangling participles or anything else that might impress us grammatically

or in the way of speeches or whatever else. It was the authority behind what he said. And he's going to explain this to us. So how knoweth this man letters, having never learned? Jesus answered them, saying, I'm going to add some words to the Scriptures, so those of you that think you're not allowed to, you might want to put your fingers in your ears. This starts out saying, my doctrine is not mine. But Jesus was answering their question how knoweth this man letters having never learned jesus answered them saying because

comma my doctrine is not mine you see this is this is something that escapes the average christian the average bible scholar the average bible teacher out there it just seems to escape them because here i want you to order my dvd why because i'm the only one in the world that knows what I'm talking about. I am the authority. Well, you know what? He might be. As a matter of fact, I think a lot of these preachers that record some of these ideas and such, I think they are the authority. They are the expert because whatever it is they're teaching, they just made it up.

That makes them the expert. So here Jesus is saying that you have to understand that the doctrine that I'm preaching is not something I came up with. This doctrine is not mine. But his that sent me. Now here you have Jesus dividing, verbally dividing himself from the Father, saying that we've got two entities working here. But I am not his God, he is my God. You understand that?

So much for a co-equal trinity you're a trinitarian idea he doesn't he doesn't he's not under any delusion that he's equal with god it's it's not in him you don't ever hear him say that he's saying the doctrine that i'm teaching that you're so fascinated with that you think I need to be educated to know? The reason I know these things? Because it's not mine. This is what I've lived with my whole life. You know, he lived with the Father before he got here. If any man do his will, he shall know the doctrine.

Is there anything to talk about here about education and going to seminary and reading books and studying and playing around memorizing doctrines and memorizing articles of faith memorizing you know the the arguments for the trinity the arguments for baptism the arguments for the lord's supper you for baptism, the arguments for the Lord's Supper, you know, the resurrection, you know, did Jesus, did he have a spiritual body? Did he have a physical body? Did he, all this stuff that people just fascinate themselves with and busy themselves with are all available

to anyone who will do God's will. There it is. If any man will do his will, he will know the doctrine. So how do these things come about? How do you become this spiritual giant that you want to be so badly? Do the will of god this is why in my advice to you what is it keep the commandments there's the will of god you can do never disobey your conscience there's the will of god you can do take time every day to hear the voice of god there's him teaching to the doctrine don you just make it sound so simple it is really

simple it really is but the problem is whatever it is you want to know you want to know right now that's the problem you may not need to know it now oh you might need it to impress your friends at the water cooler you might need it to impress your friends in your sunday school class uh maybe you have been uh uh installed in your church as a sunday school teacher so everybody expects you to uh come in there with something new to teach them and so therefore you're under an obligation to learn this stuff man there are so many traps in this. Preachers are under this trap. You've got to preach Sunday morning and Sunday night.

That's 104 sermons a year. How are you going to get that much material? By golly, you're going to read. You're going to study. You ever heard some pitiful preacher up there preaching, using football analogies and baseball analogies and basketball analogies and talking about what's going on in hollywood and stars and you know the latest cars or clothes or whatever's going on you know why that's what his life's full of

he doesn't have anything else to preach so he calls them metaphors. He calls them similes and examples and whatever he wants to call them. But the truth is, he doesn't do the commandments of God, so he doesn't know the doctrine. What he does is, is the commandments of his own. He does what he wants to do, and they happen to involve all those things. So therefore, I guess when he's sitting there at the football game and see somebody fumble it fumble the ball and

somebody else pick it up run the other way he sits there and he just thinks you know that's a lot like the christian life and he takes out his little notepad. He's, what is he doing? He's making a sermon for you, buddy. Why? Because you're going there for him to teach you. Why? Because you're not doing the will of God. Why don't you do the will of God? Why don't you keep his commandments? Why don't you not disobey your conscience during the day? Why don't you take time every day to hear the voice of God? do you know he can teach you and here's the beautiful thing he teaches you exactly what you need to know today i don't know if you think that's if you think that's important your car it doesn't run very well it needs a tune

up well what are you going to do are you going to you're going to go out there and fix it well i would but i've been studying automatic transmissions for three, what are you going to do? Are you going to go out there and fix it? Well, I would, but I've been studying automatic transmissions for three months. That's not going to do me any good when I have to tune up my car. See, Jesus knows these things about us. He knows what's coming up in our life. He knows the tune-up is scheduled. So what's he going to teach us this week? He's going to teach us what we need to know

no he doesn't teach you how to do tune-ups on your car he might but i kind of doubt it but he knows that sour nasty stinking rotten negative attitude that's going to be all over your beautiful little daughter that comes home from college this year how are you going to handle that how are you going to help her work her way through that you're going to have the wisdom you're going to know the words to say you're going to know how to deal with that you're going to know how to love her in that are you going to be able to arrest that situation so that it doesn't cause her trouble later down the road? That that rebellion doesn't turn into hatred toward her own parents and it doesn't turn it to create in her mind some vindictive actions like running off with some guy or getting pregnant or quitting college or

quitting school or doing something stupid you know who knows all these things our lord god knows these things and he can train us and teach us and lead us and guide us and give us the words what are you going to do what are you going to do with this girl sitting at the table complaining about everything, everything that's wrong with the world? Because this is the way she's been taught. What are you going to do with that poor, misguided, misdirected, convoluted little girl that you dearly love? What are you going to do? You're going to teach her about the yolk and the egg and the shell and this is why there's a trinity? Is that what you're going to do?

Well, that'll help her. That'll help her. Teach her about the doctrines of baptism and the Lord's Supper. Well, that'll do. That'll really work. Look, are you making fun? Yes, I am. Because I'm talking from experience. Religion, this education process, all this stuff, not being able to put pants on the scriptures, not being able to see Jesus with Levi's on, you know, this unrealistic religious junk

that has cluttered our lives and our minds and stolen our time and in many cases stolen our entire family from us it's got to go it's got to go what are you going to do go to the next seminar the next child rearing seminar or are you going to become the person you need to be? You see, Jesus knew better, didn't he? He says, you know how come I'm so cotton-picking smart? Because the doctrine's not mine. If you want to have that kind of power,

that kind of knowledge, that kind of depth in your speaking, if you want your children to hear that kind of knowledge, that kind of depth in your speaking. If you want your children to hear that kind of authority, first of all, you're going to have to live it yourself. I know, bad news? Yeah. You're going to have to have that kind of character. But if you have it, and you do keep His commandments, you are acknowledging the fact that He is your God.

You're entering into the contract. You're entering into the contract. You're entering into the agreement that he made, the promise that he made. You keep my commandments, I'll move into you and I'll teach you what you need to know. If you've done that and you're keeping his commandments and you're not disobeying your conscience, you're not just playing this thing. You're willing to die for what you believe. You're following Christ along. You're going to be amazed at the power you have over that. A little situation with your poor little daughter

and her brain blank because some goofy college professor erased everything in it and told her how stupid you are i'll tell you these are high stakes we're playing with today you want to keep doing what you're doing you know i'll tell you what's really sad about a lot of this most people's lives are in such a mess they can't even see that that's a problem their daughter comes spends thanksgiving with them gets up and goes back to college and they never saw a thing they never heard a thing they don't even know she's on her way to destruction how are you going to do this how i gotta know have you got a plan or you just no plan you're just gonna take it as it comes

well there's nothing you can do about that you know it's all been decided before god knows all this stuff god's in control i hope he's not because this is a mess we're living in today. This is a mess. And if he's in control of this, he's not doing a very good job. You know what the problem is? We're in control. That's the problem. And we're the ones responsible.

It's bad news and good news because we can fix this. We can fix it. We can fix it. You can fix it with his help. So here's key. Jesus says, the doctrine's not mine. It's his that sent me. If any man will do his will, he'll know the doctrine,

whether it be of God or whether I speak of myself. You hear this? I hope you're hearing the red words for the first time. When you start understanding who Jesus was and what he was all about, the words start making sense. I get that. I'm speaking his words and not my own. Where did he get his words? Where are you going to get them? You going to quote scripture to your poor little girl? You know what? She's already heard it.

And she's actively pursued in an enterprise in college that is destroying this Bible every day. There's nothing in it worthwhile. There's a handful of things in there that Jesus might have said, but we're not even really sure that he was born. I mean, really. These are rough times we're living in. They're dangerous times. You don't want to be found in the kingdom of God without your children.

All right, he says, He that speaketh of himself seeks his own glory, but he that seeks his glory that sent him, the same is true, and no unrighteousness is in him. Now, if you want to know the basic unrighteousness in most Bible teachers, there it is, right there. Most Bible teachers are proud when they have a subject, a title, a PowerPoint presentation, an idea, a concept, or something that they can teach that nobody else has ever even thought of.

It's hugely tempting on the part of a preacher. Look, I am a a preacher i know what that's like i live that way i understand that but you know here jesus is saying that if a person is seeking his glory the one who has taught me if i'm seeking his glory there's no unrighteousness in that but if it's my revelation it was something that i learned it if it's something I happen to be intrigued with, and I'm going to impart it to you, or sell it to you for $69.95, then what's my purpose? It's an unrighteous promotion of myself. Jesus

wouldn't even involve himself in promotion. And if there's anybody in the world that could have withstood promotion, it would have been him. He goes on to tell the Jews, you know, you think a lot of Moses? Why do you think so much of Moses? Because he gave you the law? Let's listen to what he has to say. Did not Moses give you the law,

and yet none of you keeps the law? Do you hear this? Why are you so intrigued with the law? You're not keeping it. Well, I'll tell you why we're so intrigued with it we teach it in our yeshivas we are versed in the law you know they say the scribes um they they only copied out a handful of books but they copied every letter of it this is why they were always consulted in in certain situation how say the scribes that remember that how say the scribes that, remember that? How say the scribes that Elijah must first come for an example?

Why do they say that? Well, because they read it in Scripture. Because they copied it themselves over and over again. They're very well versed in Scripture. He says, you intrigued with Moses? Yeah, man, that's our bread and butter. That's how we run our whole church thing here. We prescribe the law to people.

You might prescribe it, you might teach it, but nobody's obeying it. What do you mean? Nobody's obeying it. Of course we're obeying it. He says, then why go you about to kill me you know i can just imagine these guys looking at each other did you tell him who who told him that we were trying well they even they even asked the people answered thou hast the devil who goeth about to kill thee? Or who told you anybody's going to kill you? Jesus said, I've done one work, and you've all marveled.

Moses therefore gave you unto circumcision. Not because it's of Moses, but because it's of the Father. Here we go again. Men, revelation from men, revelation from the Father himself. And ye on the Sabbath day circumcise a man. If a man on the Sabbath day

receives circumcision that the law of Moses should not be broken, are you angry at me because I made a man every whit hole on the Sabbath day received circumcision at the law of Moses should not be broken. Are you angry at me because I made a man every whit hole on the Sabbath day? Judge not according to the appearance, but judge righteous judgment. Some of those who heard him said, Is not this he whom they seek to kill?

But lo, he speaketh boldly, and they say nothing unto him. Do the rulers know indeed that this is the very Christ? Howbeit we know this man whence he is. But when Christ cometh no man knoweth whence he is. Let me make a note here. This was understood among many of the Jews that the appearance of Jesus Christ would be a mystery in many ways, and one of the ways was that he was going to merely

simply appear. And nobody would know where he came from. But this was was just it was just a thought in a man's mind it's not in scripture it doesn't teach that at all as a matter of fact the wise men who came to bethlehem you remember them why did they come we saw his star in the east and are come to worship him. They, and I don't know how, but they, by the motion of the stars, the alignment of the stars, they were told exactly when and where he was going to be born. There's no reason why the Jews shouldn't know that. But it was understood. You know, it's just a saying like don't walk under a

ladder or don't let a black cat cross your path it's in the same category he says when the when christ cometh no man knoweth whence he is jesus cried out as he was teaching ye both know me and know whence I am. And I'm not come of myself, but he that sent me is true, whom ye know not. But I know him, for I am from him, and he has sent me. Jesus is so frustrated. Where did you get all these ideas? You don't accept me because I don't fit the the ideas the plans the

the the pattern the schematic the the form that you've laid out for messiah that's why you're having trouble believing in who i am because men have taught you this he walked up to his disciples after seeing the pharisees and the scribes over there messing with him. I mentioned it a while ago. They told him, this can't be the Messiah because Elijah hasn't come. Jesus, you know what? He went straight to the Pharisees and said, what question are you with them? He wanted to know.

What are you doing with my disciples? Putting stupid ideas into their heads. Get away from here. His disciples ask him later, well, didn't they have a point? Wasn't that true? Isn't Elijah supposed to come before you do? Jesus says, he's already been here, and they didn't recognize him. You can't go by what they say.

They don't recognize him. You can't go by what they say. They don't know squat. Here Elijah's standing right in front of them and they don't know him. Stick with me, guys. I'll teach you. I'll guide you. I'll lead you. All right, it's time for us to go.

Time's up already. Don at thinkredink.com. Write to me. I'd appreciate it. Till next time, Think Red Ink, my friend. Bye-bye. You've been listening to Don C. Harris of Think Red Ink Ministries. Email don at thinkredink.com. That's thinkredc.com. That's ThinkRedInc.com.

Join us again for the next episode in the Words of Jesus series. you